w 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 

IN  MEMORY  OF 
MRS.  VIRGINIA  B.  SPORER 


THE   GREEK  GENIUS   AND   ITS   INFLUENCE 


THE  GREEK  GENIUS  AND 
ITS  INFLUENCE 

Select  Essays  and  Extracts 


EDITED  BY 

LANE    COOPER 

PROFESSOR   OF   THE   ENGLISH   LANGUAGE   AND 
LITERATURE  IN  CORNELL  UNIVERSITY 


NEW  HAVEN:  YALE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

LONDON:   HUMPHREY  MILFORD 

OXFORD  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

MDCCCCXVII 


Copyright,  1917 
By  Yale  University  Press 


First  published,  October,  1917 


Collsge 
library 

DP 
77 
677^ 


TO 

CHARLES   GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

PROFESSOR  OP  ENGLISH    IN  PRINCETON  UNIVERSITY 

IN  FKIENDSHIP  AND  GRATITUDE 


2042133 


Greece,  the  nurse  of  all  good  arts. — Spenser 


PREFACE 

This  volume  appears  in  response  to  the  needs  of  one  of  ray 
classes,  and  is  meant  to  supply  a  part  of  the  necessary  background 
for  the  study  of  Greek  and  Latin  masterpieces  in  standard  English 
translations,  and  to  stimulate  and  rectify  the  comparison  of  ancient 
with  modern  literature.  But  I  hope  it  will  be  useful  also  to  classi- 
cal students  in  the  narrower  sense,  and  trust  it  may  in  some  fashion 
promote  the  study  of  Greek  in  America,  if  only  by  striking  a  blow 
at  the  provincial  notion  that  we  have  nothing  to  learn  from  the 
past. 

Doubtless  there  is  an  element  of  chance  in  the  selection  of  mate- 
rials for  a  volume  like  this.  Indeed,  I  must  admit  at  the  outset 
my  inability  to  secure  from  the  publishers  the  right  to  reprint 
Butcher's  first  essay  (What  We  Owe  to  Greece)  in  Some  Aspects 
of  the  Greek  Genius,  and  Livingstone's  third  chapter  (The  Note 
of  Directness)  in  The  Greek  Genius  and  its  Meaning  to  Us,  both 
of  which  I  would  gladly  have  included.  But  aside  from  these  I 
may  affirm  that  the  choice  is  probably  less  fortuitous  than  may 
appear  on  the  surface,  since  I  have  been  guided  by  conscious  prin- 
ciples in  selecting  and  rejecting  materials,  and  for  the  most  part 
in  arranging  the  materials  selected. 

Of  purposeful  omissions,  what  shall  I  say?  I  seem  to  have  read 
much  (of  course,  not  all)  of  what  has  latterly  been  written  on  the 
nature  of  the  Greek  genius  and  its  legacy  to  modern  times;  and 
a  great  deal  of  what  is  said  on  the  topic  strikes  me  as  misleading. 
Partly  under  the  influence  of  Boeckh  and  Croiset,  I  have,  in  the 
course  of  a  dozen  years,  formed  a  somewhat  definite  notion  of  the 
Greek  spirit,  and  have  come  almost  instinctively,  and  yet  for  defi- 
nite reasons,  to  eliminate  what  have  seemed  to  me  perilous  devia- 
tions from  a  true  perspective.  One  could  not  very  well  proceed 
otherwise. 

The  selections  have  been  taken  from  humbler  and  loftier,  and 
from  more  or  less  erudite,  sources.  I  have  had  to  keep  in  mind 
the  probable  effect  of  the  part  and  the  whole  upon  a  certain  kind 
of  student,  and  have  not  scrupled  to  use  any  legitimate  means  to 
this  end,  however  remote  and  abstract,  or  however  homespun  the 
means  (as,  for  example,  in  the  Introduction)  may  be;  it  is  better 


viii  PREFACE 

to  risk  the  ridicule  of  the  unsympathetic  than  to  fail  in  attaining 
one's  object.  The  most  important  of  all  the  selections,  the  key- 
stone of  my  arch,  is  my  translation  from  Boeckh's  Encyclopadie 
und  Methodologie  der  Philologischen  Wissenschaften.  No  apology 
need  be  made  for  the  length  of  this  extract  from  a  book  of  extraor- 
dinary significance  in  modern  classical  scholarship,  but  one  that  is 
sadly  neglected  by  our  day  and  generation.  The  selection  may  not 
offer  easy  reading,  for  Boeckh  makes  heavy  demands  upon  the 
translator,  yet  to  the  judicious  student  it  will  serve  as  a  touchstone 
for  the  worth  of  other  characterizations  of  antiquity. 

There  may,  in  point  of  fact,  be  slight  differences  of  opinion  in 
the  various  authors  represented.  But  when  allowance  is  made  for 
the  diversity  of  sources,  and  the  variety  of  special  purposes  enter- 
tained by  the  several  writers,  I  trust  that  one  selection  will  not 
often  contradict  another  in  any  serious  way,  but  that  all  will  in 
the  long  run  reinforce  one  another  in  such  fashion  that  casual  error 
will  make  no  lasting  impression,  and  substantial  truth,  constantly 
reappearing,  will  disengage  itself  from  what  is  accidental,  and  take 
firm  possession  of  the  memory. 

As  for  the  order,  an  attempt  has  been  made,  where  possible,  to 
let  one  selection  lead  up  to  another,  sometimes  by  a  more  super- 
ficial, sometimes  by  a  deeper,  association  of  ideas.  In  general,  the 
sequence  is  this.  We  pass  from  the  external  environment  of  the 
Greeks  to  a  characterization  of  the  race,  and  of  Athens  at  the 
zenith  of  its  power.  Then  come  three  intermediate  selections  (from 
Professor  von  "Wilamowitz-Moellendorff,  Professor  Murray,  and 
Professor  Rand),  representing  the  links  between  the  ancient  and 
the  modern  world.  And  finally,  beginning  with  Dr.  Osgood's 
remarks  on  Milton's  use  of  classical  mythology,  we  have  a  series  of 
essays  and  extracts  more  directly  concerned  with  modern  times 
and  the  surviving  element  of  antiquity.  It  will  be  found,  however, 
that  virtually  every  writer  here  included  has  dwelt  with  some  force 
upon  the  relation  of  Greece  to  the  modern  era  or  our  own  day. 
An  occasional  reference  to  Rome  and  Latin  literature,  as  inter- 
mediary between  Hellenism  and  modern  times,  could  not  be 
avoided — nor  has  there  been  any  desire  to  avoid  it,  in  the  Bibliog- 
raphy or  elsewhere.  Even  so,  the  title  of  the  book  does  not 
improperly  indicate  the  contents. 

Apart  from  any  special  interest  they  may  have  for  students  of 
literature,  I  could  wish  that  the  characterizations  of  the  Greek  race 
might  meet  the  eye  of  the  geographer  and  anthropologist.  Having 
rather  in  mind  the  modern  European  nations  and  America,  Fried- 


PREFACE  ix 

rich  Ratzel  used  to  deplore  the  scarcity  of  such  characterizations 
from  the  hands  of  competent  writers.  And  indeed,  such  appraisals 
as  that  of  the  American  character  in  Bryce's  American  Common- 
wealth, or  that  of  the  French  in  Lanson's  Histoire  de  la  Litterature 
Frangaise,  or  even  the  suggested  characterization  of  the  English  in 
Jespersen's  Growth  and  Structure  of  the  English  Language,  are 
rare.  Whether  any  considerable  number  exists  for  the  Hebrew 
race  I  cannot  say;  one  thinks,  of  course,  of  Matthew  Arnold's 
'Hebraism  and  Hellenism,'  and  the  like,  which  would  hardly  eon- 
tent  the  scholar  and  the  scientist.  If  the  number  is  large,  it  would 
be  well  to  collect  them  and  publish  certain  excellent  specimens. 
Meanwhile,  is  it  not  worth  noting  that  for  the  Greek  race,  which 
would  commonly  be  chosen  as  typical  of  humanity,  we  have  very 
many  of  these  characterizations  ?  So  far  as  I  am  aware,  the  present 
volume,  designed  in  the  main  for  other  purposes,  constitutes  the 
first  attempt  to  present  a  body  of  such  material. 

Finally,  I  have  the  pleasant  duty  of  thanking  several  of  my 
friends  and  pupils  for  direct  assistance  and  helpful  suggestions, 
of  which  I  availed  myself  particularly  in  the  translations;  and  of 
expressing  my  obligations  to  the  authors  and  publishers  who  have 
kindly  allowed  me  to  reprint  copyright  material.  These  obligations, 
as  I  hope,  are  all  fully  recorded  in  the  proper  places. 

Lane  Cooper. 
Ithaca,  New  York, 
June  15,  1917. 


CONTENTS 


Introduction:  The  Significance  of  the  Classics   . 

I.     Shelley,  from  Hellas     ..... 
II.    John  Clarke  Stobart,  The  Legacy  of  Greece  . 

III.  Francis   G.   and   Anne   C.   E.   Allinson,    External 

Nature  in  Greek  Poetry  .... 

IV.  Milton,  from  Paradise  Regained    . 
V.     John  Henry  Newman,  Attica  and  Athens 

VI.     Sir  Richard  Jebb,  The  Age  of  Pericles  . 

VII.     Arthur  Elam  Haigh,  The  Attic  Audience 

VIII.    Maurice  Croiset,  The  Greek  Race  and  Its  Genius 

IX.     August  Boeckh,  The  Nature  of  Antiquity 

X.     Abby  Leach,  Fate  and  Free  Will  in  Greek  Literature 

XI.     Marjorie  L.  Barstow,  Oedipus  Rex:  a  Typical  Greek 

Tragedy         ....... 

XII.     Ulrich  von  Wilamowitz-Moellendorff,  The  Character 
and  Extent  of  Greek  Literature 

XIII.  Gilbert  Murray,  The  'Tradition'  of  Greek  Literature 

XIV.  Edward  Kennard  Rand,  The  Classics  in  European 

Education      ....... 

XV.     Charles  Grosvenor  Osgood,  Milton's  Use  of  Classical 
Mythology      ...... 

XVI.     Samuel  Lee  Wolff,  The  Greek  Gift  to  Civilization 
XVII.     Thaddaeus  Zielinski,  Our  Debt  to  Antiquity  . 
XVIII.     Basil  L.  Gildersleeve,  Americanism  and  Hellenism 
XIX.     Ernest  Renan,  Paganism      .... 

XX.     Gilbert  K.   Chesterton,  Paganism  and  Mr.  Lowes 
Dickinson       ...... 

XXI.     Browning,  from  Old  Pictures  in  Florence 
Bibliography     ........ 

Index        ......... 


PAGE 

1 
23 
25 

34 
47 
49 
63 

77 
85  ^ 
98 
132 

156 

163 

168 

183 

199 

218 

33C 

^43 
261 

269 

278 
281 
287 


INTRODUCTION 

THE  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  CLASSICS  x 

By  Lane  Cooper 

The  literature  of  Greece  and  Rome  is  a  fountain  of  life,  yet  the 
languages  are  often  called  'dead.'  What  is  a  'dead'  language? 
Once  it  is  uttered,  all  language  is  dead.  The  language  of  Shake- 
speare, of  Milton,  and  of  Tennyson,  is  dead.  The  language  you 
uttered  half  an  hour  ago  is  dead,  and  these  words  of  mine,  if 
spoken,  would  be  dying  as  fast  as  they  were  born.  My  opening 
sentence  would  already  have  passed  away — and  my  closing  one 
you  could  not  know,  since  for  you  it  would  not  yet  have  come  into 
being.  Your  language  of  half  an  hour  ago  can  easily  be  revived, 
and  these  syllables  which  I  pronounced  some  two  years  since, 
should  you  read  them  aloud,  would  be  breathing  again  this  very 
moment.  Thanks  to  an  alphabet  which  England  and  America 
owe  to  Greece  and  Rome,  the  language  of  Tennyson  and  Milton 
likewise  can  be  brought  to  life  again.  So,  too,  with  the  language 
of  Shakespeare — though  here  the  vitalizing  process  demands  a  con- 
scious expenditure  of  energy.  But  Chaucer,  that  well-spring  of 
English  undefiled,  is  'dead'  (which  at  this  point  means  difficult) 
to  many.  And  so  is  Virgil,  that  fount  which  for  the  living  Dante 
spread  so  broad  a  stream  of  speech.  'Why  then,'  asks  Saint 
Augustine,  after  mentioning  his  love  of  the  Aeneid,  'Why  then  did 
I  hate  the  Greek  language  in  which  like  songs  are  sung? — for 
Homer  also  was  skilful  in  weaving  the  like  fables,  and  is  most 
sweetly- vain ;  yet  was  he  bitter  to  my  boyish  taste.  And  so  I 
suppose  would  Virgil  be  to  Grecian  children,  when  forced  to  learn 
him  as  I  was  the  other.  Difficulty,  in  truth,  the  difficulty  of  learn- 
ing a  foreign  tongue,  sprinkled  as  it  were  with  gall  all  the  sweet- 
ness of  Grecian  fables. '  Thus  Augustine,  in  the  fourth  century  of 
what  we  call  '  our  era. '    Were  he  at  school  to-day,  and  free  to  pick 

i  For  an  Introduction  to  the  volume  I  have  adapted  an  address  of  mine, 
delivered  before  the  English  Club  of  Bryn  Mawr  College,  December  13, 
1914. — Editor. 


2  LANE  COOPER 

his  studies,  what  courses  would  he  cunningly  avoid?  Courses  in 
the  'dead  languages'!  A  dead  language,  then,  is  one  that  some 
persons  are  too  indolent  to  learn — or,  when  they  attempt  to  learn 
it,  they  find  their  spirits  running  bankrupt.  To  tell  the  truth, 
the  written  language  remains  just  what  it  was  and  is,  a  fountain 
of  life  if  it  be  Greek,  and  something  less  if  it  be  Choctaw ;  but  the 
discovery  is  made  that  certain  persons,  who  seemed  to  be  alive, 
are  dead  to  the  language.  Lacking  some  measure  of  vitality  or 
sensitiveness,  they  desire,  as  they  say,  to  study  the  things  of  the 
present. 

What  is  the  present?  Is  it  this  minute,  or  day,  or  year?  Is  it 
'  our  era '  ?  And  what  is  our  era  ?  Not  the  past  ten  years  certainly. 
Strictly  speaking,  the  present  can  hardly  be  anything  that  is  past, 
the  very  form  of  words  precludes  this.  We  may  describe  the 
present  as  an  advancing  line,  and  only  a  line,  between  the  future, 
of  which  we  know  nothing  (save  through  a  study  of  the  past),  and 
the  past,  from  which,  if  we  choose  our  methods  wisely,  we  may 
learn  much.  Paradoxically  enough,  we  can  only  know  the  present 
when  it  has  ceased  to  be  such,  and  has  become  history.  The  past 
is  the  field  of  human  experience;  if  recorded,  it  is  the  field  of 
human  knowledge.  Accordingly,  for  the  individual,  speaking  more 
generally,  the  present  is  so  much  of  human  experience  as  he  may 
at  any  moment  revive  within  himself.  For  the  artisan  it  may 
include  his  memory  of  the  last  strike;  for  the  statesman  it  may 
embrace  the  political  and  economic  history  of  Europe  and  America 
from  the  age  of  Pericles  in  Athens  to  this  very  day.  It  is  one  thing 
for  Milton,  who  first  relived  the  life  of  antiquity  as  a  scholar,  then 
served  his  country  as  an  officer  of  state,  and  finally  bequeathed  the 
best  he  knew  in  human  life  to  succeeding  ages  in  his  immortal 
poetry.  It  is  another  thing  for  the  modern  youth  who  hears  the 
word  'Czar'  or  'Kaiser,'  and  does  not  recognize  in  it  a  Latin  word 
which  for  twenty  centuries  has  issued  daily  from  the  lips  of  living 
men;  and  who  does  not  know  that  'Christ'  is  a  Greek  word  that 
will  never  die. 

There  are,  then,  no  dead  languages,  though  there  be  men  and 
women  who  have  a  name  that  they  live,  and  are  dead.  And  the 
present  is  either  a  line  without  breadth,  or  it  is  a  tract  as  extensive 
and  as  full  of  life  and  meaning  as  the  insight  of  the  student  can 
make  it.  The  only  real  limit  is  the  measure  of  his  sympathy.  He 
fills  the  present  with  life  and  meaning  by  a  study  of  the  past. 

By  a  study  of  all  the  past  ?  No,  that  is  impossible ;  no  one  could 
examine  all  the  records  of  the  past,  or  even  all  the  main  ones.    By 


INTRODUCTION  3 

a  study  of  the  past  ten  years,  then?  No,  ordinarily  that  will  not 
be  wise.  Every  decade  in  its  time  has  been  a  past  ten  years,  and 
a  decade  or  a  century  must  have  something  to  recommend  it  beyond 
the  fact  that  it  preceded  a  certain  date.  We  will  permit  the  his- 
torian to  say  that  to  him  one  period  is  as  instructive  as  another, 
since  he  must  add  that,  in  order  to  know  one  as  a  historian  should, 
he  must  know  many  others.  But  for  the  ends  of  a  preliminary 
education,  we  must  allow  that  some  periods  have  shown  a  more 
abundant  life  than  others.  And  the  farther  back  our  rich  and 
vital  period  happens  to  be,  within  recorded  history,  the  longer  will 
jX  have  been  studied  and  elucidated  by  the  gifted  in  succeeding 
ages,  and  hence  the  clearer  and  fuller  will  its  message  be  to  us. 
"Witness  the  great  age  of  creative  activity  in  Greece:  for  an  inter- 
pretation of  this  we  of  to-day  are  indebted  first  to  the  poems  and 
other  works  of  art  themselves,  then  to  the  critics  of  Alexandria, 
then  to  the  literary  men  of  Rome,  then,  in  some  sort,  to  the  Middle 
Ages,  then  to  the  scholars  of  the  Renaissance — Italian,  Dutch,  and 
English — then  to  the  universities  of  France  and  Germany,  and 
finally  to  the  last  generation  of  learned  men  in  every  civilized 
nation. 

One  patent  aim  in  these  reflections  has  been  to  suggest  the  idea 
of  a  continuity  in  human  life.  To  sever  our  connection  with  the 
past  means  cutting  ourselves  off  from  humanity ;  it  means  spiritual 
atrophy;  it  means  death.  Another  aim  has  been  to  emphasize  our 
need  of  selecting  parts  or  periods  of  civilization  for  intensive  study 
as  especially  deserving  it.    What  are  such  periods? 

It  will  be  conceded  that  the  epoch  which  has  most  vitally  influ- 
enced the  subsequent  culture  of  Europe,  and  of  peoples  like  our 
own  that  derive  from  Europe,  is  what  we  call  the  beginning  of 
our  era,  the  years  that  furnished  the  world  with  a  Christian  civili- 
zation. If  it  is  the  function  of  humane  study  to  provide  mankind 
with  a  self -perpetuating  and  ever  more  exalted  ideal  of  human  life, 
and  thus  to  make  life  more  and  more  abundant,  there  can  be  little 
doubt  as  to  the  century  that  first  demands  the  attention  of  serious 
students.  It  is  the  century  embracing  the  life  of  Christ  and  the 
lives  of  his  immediate  followers ;  and  the  chief  document  by  virtue 
of  which  one  may  include  it  in  one's  experience  is  a  little  book  in 
Greek,  containing  four  biographies,  with  a  sequel  to  one  of  them, 
twenty-one  letters,  and  a  vision — all  commonly  misunderstood  by 
those  who  read  about  the  work  more  than  they  read  the  work 
itself.  Here  we  have  the  living  and  life-giving  record  of  a  human 
ideal  so  ennobled  that  we  term  it,  no  longer  human,  but  divine.    In 


4  LANE  COOPER 

spite  of  constant  misinterpretation,  it  is  ever  present  among  us. 
May  I  add  that  a  so-called  higher  education  which  does  not  enable 
the  student  to  read  the  highest  things  as  they  ought  to  be  read  is 
not  worthy  of  the  name?  Yet  a  good  teacher  of  Greek  can  put 
any  intelligent  undergraduate  in  America  into  vital  contact  with 
the  New  Testament  within  the  space  of  three  or  four  months. 

Next  in  importance  we  may  set  the  thirteenth  century,  'the  age 
which  of  all  whose  memory  remains  to  us  [except  the  one  just 
mentioned]  produced  the  greatest  number  of  great  men.  This  was 
the  age  of  Frederick  the  Second,  Lewis  the  Ninth,  Simon  of  Mont- 
fort,  Thomas  Aquinas,  Roger  Bacon ;  the  age  which  saw  the  revival 
of  painting  in  Cimabue  and  Giotto,  of  sculpture  in  Nicholas ;  while 
Amiens  and  Westminster,  the  Old  Palace  of  Florence  and  the  Holy 
Field  of  Pisa,  are  living  evidence  of  what  it  could  do  in  the  noblest 
of  all  the  arts.'2  It  was  the  representative  century  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  which  have  given  us  the  modern  nations  of  Europe,  modern 
as  distinct  from  Roman  law,  government  through  elected  deputies, 
modern  languages  and  modern  poetry  in  the  vernacular,  the  Divine 
Comedy,  and  the  French  cathedrals.  Here  again  the  contribution 
of  the  epoch  may  be  summarily  described  as  the  establishment  of 
an  ideal  pattern  for  the  life  of  posterity.  How  clearly  we  may 
behold  this  exalted  ideal  of  humanity  as  it  forms,  reforms,  and 
transcends  itself  in  the  poem  of  Dante — in  the  poet  himself  as  he 
travels  from  Hell  through  Purgatory  to  Heaven,  in  his  Virgil, 
type  of  the  wisdom  of  classical  antiquity,  in  Matilda,  in  Beatrice, 
in  Bernard,  rising  ever  higher  until,  suffused  with  the  light  of  the 
eternal,  the  human  is  merged  in  the  divine !  Nor  am  I  aware  of 
any  substitute  from  the  rest  of  secular  literature  that  will  per- 
form in  the  education  of  our  youth  just  the  service  that  this  poem 
will  render  if  properly  studied,  that  is,  in  connection  with  its  age. 
Assuredly,  in  more  than  one  respect  the  classics  will  not  take  its 
place. 

Then  what  of  the  value  of  the  classics?  The  representative  age 
of  classic  literature,  and  this  must  mean  of  Greece,  the  hundred 
years  or  so  from  Pericles  to  Alexander,  we  shall  not  rate  too  high 
if  we  put  it  third  in  importance  among  the  epochs  that  have  served 
to  form  and  fashion  modern  life.  That  the  influence  of  Greece 
has  been  exerted  upon  Europe  mainly  through  the  instrumentality 
of  Rome  does  not  at  the  moment  concern  us.  And  that  modern 
Europe  has  learned  grammar  through  Latin  (which  is  a  better  way 
than  trying  to  learn  it  from  modern  English)  rather  than  from 

2  Arthur  John  Butler,   The  Purgatory  of  Dante,  Preface,  p.  xii. 


INTRODUCTION  5 

Greek  (which  is  better  still) — this  need  not  detain  us,  either; 
though  no  one  could  wish  more  ardently  than  the  writer  that  the 
present  generation  might  take  this  now  neglected  discipline  more 
seriously.  How  indeed  are  we  to  study  economics,  or  pedagogy,  or 
domestic  science  (the  latest  fads,  yet  all  with  names  betraying  the 
vitality  of  Greek  and  Latin),  when  our  pupils  cannot  keep  the 
peace  between  two  nouns  and  a  verb,  much  less  appreciate  the 
meaning  of  scientific  terms? — for  our  scientific  terminology  is  still 
supplied  by  persons  who  know  the  ancient  tongues.  The  value, 
disciplinary  or  otherwise,  of  linguistic  study,  however,  great  as  it 
is  in  the  case  of  the  classics,  is  not  my  topic.  My  topic  is  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  human  ideal,  considered  in  outline,  which  classic 
Greece  transmitted  to  imperial  Rome,  and  hence  to  modern  times. 

I  have  already  tried  to  define  this  ideal  in  a  negative  way,  for 
it  has  its  limitations.  The  Magnanimous  Man  of  the  Nicomachean 
Ethics  falls  short,  far  short,  of  the  Christian  ideal;  and,  wise 
though  she  be,  that  reverend  dame,  Diotima,  who  unlocks  the  final 
truth  for  Socrates,  has  not  the  depth  of  knowledge,  and  has  none 
of  the  tenderness,  of  Dante's  Beatrice.  The  dialogues  on  love  of 
Plato,  his  Phaedrus  and  Symposium,  show  what  could  be  done  by 
the  Greek  who  was  nearest  in  soul  to  the  Christian,  in  representing 
the  highest  aspirations  of  the  human  heart;  but  they  are  pale  and 
cold  beside  Dante's  Vita  Nuova,  not  to  speak  of  the  Thirteenth 
Chapter  of  First  Corinthians.  The  mediaeval  doctrine  of  'the 
gentle  heart,'  which  created  a  literature  of  its  own  with  the  sweet 
new  style  of  modern  poetry,  and  which  underlies  our  present-day 
notions  of  a  lady  and  a  gentleman,  we  shall  hardly  look  for  in  the 
writings  of  pagan  Greece  and  pagan  Rome ;  occasionally,  not  often, 
we  may  find  a  something  of  the  sort;  the  thing  itself  is  lacking, 
unless  perhaps  in  Virgil,  in  a  few  passages  where  he  seems  to  be 
scarcely  pagan. 

For  all  that,  when  we  have  made  allowance  for  his  lack  of 
Christian  humility,  and  of  'the  gentle  heart,'  the  Magnanimous 
Man  of  Aristotle  continues  to  be  illuminating  as  a  standard  by 
which  to  judge  the  aims  and  deserts  of  our  Roosevelts,  Tafts,  and 
Wilsons;  the  goddess  Athena  still  typifies  the  utmost  exaltation 
of  pure  intellect;  and  the  myths  of  Plato  still  serve  to  disengage 
our  higher  from  our  lower  impulses,  and  to  put  the  higher  in  com- 
mand. Above  all,  the  Republic  of  Plato  will  never  fail  to  attain 
its  end  as  often  as  it  is  studied.  The  unthinking  may  complain  of 
it  as  an  impractical  dream,  incapable  of  being  realized  in  actual 
life.     It  is  realized  whenever  it  is  read,  for  the  purpose  of  its 


6  LANE  COOPER 

author  is  accomplished  in  the  reader's  mind.  There  a  new  ideal 
of  human  justice  is  always  evoked,  and  an  image  of  right  action 
so  distinct  that  no  subsequent  experience  can  wholly  efface  it. 

Accordingly,  we  may  pass  from  the  negative  to  the  positive  value 
of  the  Greek  ideal.  In  discussing  this,  I  must  say  something  of 
the  Greeks  as  a  race,  taken  at  their  best,  and  must  illustrate  a  few 
of  their  characteristics  from  translations  of  their  masterpieces; 
for  it  is  the  men  themselves  that  are  mirrored  in  their  literature. 

The  Greeks  were  the  most  versatile  and  evenly  developed  race 
that  nature  has  yet  brought  forth,  our  American  stock  not 
excepted.  They  had  seemingly  the  most  diverse  powers,  both  intel- 
lectual and  artistic,  which  were  held  in  equipoise  by  a  most  unusual 
capacity  for  checking  wayward  impulse.  'The  Hellene,'  says 
Maurice  Croiset,  'always  possessed  judgment  in  imagination,  intel- 
lect in  sentiment,  and  reflection  in  passion.  We  never  see  him 
entirely  carried  away  in  one  direction.  He  has,  so  to  speak,  a 
number  of  faculties  ready  for  every  undertaking,  and  it  is  by  a  com- 
bination of  these  that  he  gives  to  his  creations  their  true  character.  '3 
Others  have  reduced  the  essential  qualities  of  the  Greek  to  a  single 
habit,  variously  displayed — that  of  constant  unbiased  observation. 
Thus  Matthew  Arnold  says  of  Sophocles,  '  He  saw  life  steadily,  and 
saw  it  whole. '  And  so  George  Herbert  Palmer  writes :  '  After 
puzzling  long  about  the  charm  of  Homer,  I  once  applied  to  a 
learned  friend,  and  said  to  him,  "Can  you  tell  me  why  Homer  is 
so  interesting?  "Why  can't  you  and  I  write  as  he  wrote?  Why  is 
it  that  his  art  was  lost  with  him,  and  that  to-day  it  is  impossible  for 
us  to  quicken  such  interest  as  he?"  "Well,"  said  my  friend,  "I 
have  meditated  on  that  a  great  deal,  but  it  seems  to  me  it  comes 
to  about  this :  Homer  looked  long  at  a  thing.  Why, ' '  said  he,  ' '  do 
you  know  that  if  you  should  hold  up  your  thumb  and  look  at  it 
long  enough,  you  would  find  it  immensely  interesting?"  Homer 
looks  long  at  his  thumb;  he  sees  precisely  the  thing  he  is  dealing 
with.  He  does  not  confuse  it  with  anything  else.  It  is  sharp  to 
him;  and  because  it  is  sharp  to  him  it  stands  out  sharply  for  us 
over  all  these  thousands  of  years.'4  I  also,  in  a  humble  way,  have 
reflected  upon  this  very  question;  and  it  seems  to  me  that  the 
fundamental  Hellenic  traits  are  neither  many  nor  one,  but  three : 
direct  vision,  a  high  degree  of  sensitiveness,  and  an  extraordinary 
power  of  inhibition.  Homer  and  Sophocles  saw  clearly,  felt  keenly, 
and  refrained  from  much.     Their  power  of  inhibition  enabled  the 

3  Croiset,  Eistoire  de  la  Litterature  Grecque  1.4;  see  below,  p.  87. 
*  Palmer,  The  Glory  of  the  Imperfect,  pp.  23-24. 


INTRODUCTION  7 

Greeks  to  look  long  and  steadily  at  every  object,  great  and  small, 
from  the  structural  features  of  the  landscape,  the  mountains  and 
the  clouds,  to  man  both  as  an  individual  and  in  combination  with 
others  of  his  kind,  and  from  man  to  the  wasp  and  the  frog  or  the 
meanest  flower  that  blows ;  and  their  sensitiveness  made  the  impres- 
sion distinct  and  permanent.  As  a  result,  they  learned  to  see  parts 
as  parts,  and  the  relation  between  them,  and  wholes  as  wholes,  with 
the  relation  between  part  and  whole.  This  accounts  for  their  dis- 
covery of  order  and  organization  in  the  world  about  them — in  what 
they  termed  the  cosmos;  it  accounts  also  (if  genius  can  be  ex- 
plained) for  their  own  constructiveness — for  the  perfection  of  their 
architecture,  and  for  the  architectonic  qualities  of  their  prose  and 
poetry.  What  they  conceived  was  distinct  and  orderly,  like  the 
cosmos  itself;  hence  what  they  executed,  whether  temple  or  epic 
poem,  had  the  finished  structure  of  a  living  organism :  every  detail 
was  subordinate  to  the  function  of  the  whole.  Thus  the  deed  of 
horror,  the  slaying  of  Aegisthus  at  the  hand  of  Orestes,  was  sub- 
ordinate to  the  total  effect  of  the  tragic  story;  the  frieze  of  the 
horsemen  was  contributory  to  the  general  but  distinct  effect  of 
the  Parthenon;  and  the  worth  of  the  individual  was  measured  by 
his  service  to  the  State.  But  the  State  itself  was  a  being,  so  to 
speak,  like  an  animal  of  a  higher  sort,  whose  function  was  to  live 
the  life  of  reason,  contemplating  and  realizing  justice  and  truth, 
which  were  divine.  Wherever  they  looked,  these  sensitive  men 
saw  life,  divine,  distinct,  and  orderly. 

Accordingly,  the  Greeks  were  religious.  Saint  Paul,  in  fact, 
speaking  to  the  Athenians  in  their  decline,  remarked  that  they 
were  excessively  religious.  We  are  not  prone  to  think  of  them  as 
such.  We  think  of  them  as  a  joyous  race,  loving  the  sunlight, 
adorning  themselves  on  every  occasion  with  garlands  of  flowers, 
worshipers  of  human  youth  and  beauty;  inquisitive,  too,  and 
loquacious : '  For  all  the  Athenians,  and  strangers  which  were  there, 
spent  their  time  in  nothing  else,  but  either  to  tell  or  to  hear  some 
new  thing.'  But,  after  all,  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  religion  of 
joy ;  nor  does  a  delight  in  youth  and  beauty  preclude  a  serious  view 
of  human  life.  Moreover,  the  practice  of  discussion  need  not  inter- 
fere with  the  habit  of  severe  thought  about  the  highest  things.  The 
Socratic  method  of  arriving  at  truth  through  question  and  answer 
is  proverbial.  Yet  we  recall  the  story  told  of  Socrates  in  the 
Symposium:  'One  morning  he  was  thinking  about  something  which 
he  could  not  resolve ;  he  would  not  give  it  up,  but  continued  think- 
ing from  early  dawn  until  noon — there  he  stood,  fixed  in  thought ; 


8  LANE  COOPER 

and  at  noon  attention  was  drawn  to  him,  and  the  rumor  ran 
through  the  wondering  crowd  that  Socrates  had  been  standing  and 
thinking  about  something  ever  since  the  break  of  day.  At  last,  in 
the  evening  after  supper,  some  Ionians  out  of  curiosity  (I  should 
explain  that  this  occurred  not  in  winter  but  in  summer)  brought 
out  their  mats  and  slept  in  the  open  air  that  they  might  watch 
him  and  see  whether  he  would  stand  all  night.  There  he  stood 
until  the  following  morning;  and  with  the  return  of  light  he 
offered  up  a  prayer  to  the  sun,  and  went  his  way.'  And  so  the 
Greeks  thought  out  the  nature  of  Deity.  The  beauty  of  their 
loftiest  religious  conceptions  is  obscured  by  a  gross  indelicacy  in 
some  of  their  traditional  observances ;  and  the  monotheism  in  which 
their  philosophy  culminated  is  often  lost  to  us  through  the  bewilder- 
ing fecundity  of  their  artistic  imagination,  which  beheld  a  sepa- 
rate deity,  or  nymph,  or  demon,  in  every  manifestation  of  nature. 
Our  idea  of  Greek  religion  has  been  distorted  also  by  Matthew 
Arnold's  insistence  upon  the  religious  genius  of  the  Hebrew  as 
contrasted  with  the  intellectual  genius  of  the  Greek. 

Because  of  Arnold  and  his  misleading  emphasis,  this  point  may 
need  some  reinforcement.  I  shall  reinforce  it  with  a  quotation 
from  Mr.  Haigh  on  Aeschylus. 

'In  his  hands  the  religion  of  the  Greeks  has  been  raised  to  a 
higher  level  of  moral  dignity  than  it  ever  attained  either  before 
or  since. 

'The  first  point  to  be  noticed,  in  regard  to  his  religious  views,  is 
the  sublime  conception  of  Zeus  as  the  supreme  ruler  of  the  uni- 
verse. The  other  deities  are  represented  as  merely  the  ministers 
of  his  will,  and  though  still  possessing  their  usual  characteristics, 
stand  in  a  subordinate  rank.  The  language  applied  to  Zeus 
is  monotheistic  in  tone,  and  his  praises  are  chanted  in  strains  of 
the  loftiest  exaltation.  He  is  "king  of  kings,  most  blessed  of  the 
blessed,  most  mighty  of  rulers."  His  power  "knows  no  superior, 
nor  is  any  one  enthroned  above  him;  swifter  than  speech  is  the 
accomplishment  of  his  purpose."  He  "holds  for  ever  the  balance 
of  the  scales:  nothing  comes  to  mortal  man  but  by  the  will  of 
Zeus. "  "  Zeus  is  sky,  and  earth,  and  heaven ;  Zeus  is  all  things,  yea, 
greater  than  all  things."  His  power,  though  invisible,  is  omnipo- 
tent and  omnipresent.  "Dark  and  shadowy,"  it  is  said,  "are  the 
pathways  of  his  counsels,  and  difficult  to  see.  From  their  high- 
towering  hopes  he  hurleth  down  to  destruction  the  race  of  men. 
Yet  setteth  he  no  forces  in  array,   all  his  works  are  effortless. 


INTRODUCTION  9 

Seated  on  holiest  throne,  from  thence,  unknown  to  us,  he  bringeth 
his  will  to  pass."  .  .  . 

'Such  being  the  scheme  of  divine  government,  as  conceived  by- 
Aeschylus,  in  which  the  laws  of  eternal  justice  are  administered  by 
an  all-powerful  deity,  it  follows  that  injustice  can  never  prosper, 
and  that  the  punishment  of  sin  is  certain  and  inevitable.  '5 

As  for  the  intellectual  faculty  of  the  Greeks,  their  habit  of 
making  fine  yet  clear  and  true  distinctions,  of  inserting  the  edge 
of  the  mind  at  the  joint  between  ideas,  this  went  hand  in  hand 
with  their  clear  and  sharp  discrimination  of  objects  in  the  world 
about  them,  and  has  led  to  their  superiority  in  the  mental,  moral, 
and  political  sciences.  Their  excellence  here  has  so  often  been 
emphasized  that  every  one  is  aware  of  our  debt  to  the  Greeks  for 
the  foundations  of  logic,  mathematics,  ethics,  psychology,  and  the 
science  of  government. 

Something,  too,  is  generally  known  of  the  attention  they  paid 
to  the  human  body,  their  study  of  which  was  interfered  with  only 
by  their  reverence  for  it.  There  are  those  who  think  that  in  many 
respects  Greek  civilization  attained  a  stage  of  development  much 
higher  than  that  which  any  other  Aryan  stock  has  reached;  that 
in  the  general  progress  of  the  Indo-Germanic  races  the  Greeks  in 
some  respects  anticipated  our  own  future;  and  that  herein  lies 
much  of  the  value  their  example  has  for  us.  Since  our  infancy 
came  later,  they,  like  an  elder  brother,  point  out  the  course  that 
we  must  run.  However  this  may  be,  it  cannot  be  gainsaid  that  in 
the  one  article  of  disciplining  the  human  body,  and  perfecting  the 
human  form,  they  set  a  standard  which  no  nation  since,  nor  any 
part  of  it,  has  equaled,  or  is  likely  soon  to  equal.  The  indubitable 
sign  of  this  excellence  is  their  sculpture.  We  may  think  if  we  like 
that  Shakespeare  is  not  inferior  to  Sophocles  in  moving  the  heart 
through  the  tragic  drama,  though  I  for  one  would  hesitate  to  say 
so ;  and  we  may  agree  that  the  southwest  tower  of  Chartres  Cathe- 
dral shows  the  art  of  man  engaged  in  the  service  of  God  as  no 
structural  feature  of  the  Parthenon  can  show  it,  to  which  I  would 
readily  assent;  but  where  is  the  English  or  Italian  sculptor  who 
can  rival  the  Hermes  of  Praxiteles  at  Olympia?  Encomiums  of 
Greek  sculpture  are  superfluous.  On  the  other  hand,  it  may  occa- 
sion some  astonishment  when  we  learn,  upon  the  authority  of  Dr. 
Osier,  that  the  establishments  of  the  ancients  for  the  care  of  bodily 

»  A.  E.  Haigh,  The  Tragic  Drama  of  the  Greeks,  pp.  87,  88,  91. 


10  LANE  COOPER 

health  far  surpassed  in  extent  and  magnificence  our  twentieth- 
century  institutions  of  a  comparable  sort.  One  thinks  of  the  group 
of  buildings  sacred  to  Asclepius  at  Epidaurus,  which  included  a 
theatre  that  would  seat  twelve  thousand  persons.  Or  one  thinks 
of  the  extravagant  Baths  of  Caracalla  at  Rome.  Here,  perhaps, 
we  might  learn  from  the  mistakes  of  the  ancients,  since  we  seem 
in  this  country  to  be  on  the  point  of  letting  the  care  of  the  body 
run  away  with  our  institutions  of  learning.  At  their  best,  however, 
the  Greeks  preserved  a  just  balance  in  the  training  of  their  youth 
between  gymnastic  for  the  body  and  a  thorough  literary  and 
artistic,  or,  as  they  would  call  it,  'musical,'  education  for  the  soul. 
They  wished  the  motions  of  both  mind  and  body  to  be  harmonious 
and  direct.  They  were  saved  from  excess  by  their  sense  of  propor- 
tion, which  arose  from  their  clearness  of  vision. 

But  their  powers  of  observation  were  directed  also  to  the  world 
around  them.  Thus  'Phidias,  like  most  of  the  other  great  artists 
of  Greece,  was  as  much  distinguished  for  accuracy  in  the  minutest 
details  as  for  the  majesty  of  his  colossal  figures ;  and,  like  Lysippus, 
he  amused  himself,  and  gave  proofs  of  his  skill,  by  making  images 
of  minute  objects,  such  as  cicadas,  bees,  and  flies.'6  And  thus  the 
modern  ornithologist  has  something  to  learn  even  from  the  poet 
Aristophanes  in  his  comedy  of  the  Birds,  as  the  entomologist  has 
something  to  learn  from  the  Wasps,  and  the  Weather  Bureau  from 
the  Clouds.  Much  more  has  the  natural  scientist  to  learn  from  the 
actual  researches  of  the  Greeks  in  several  branches,  above  all  in 
zoology ;  mainly  in  respect  to  method,  of  course,  though  the  results 
which  we  find  in  Aristotle's  work  on  animals,  for  instance,  are  not 
negligible.  Yet  it  is  to  be  feared  that  most  of  our  zoologists  are 
ignorant  of  the  very  existence  of  his  Animalia.  The  experimental 
psychologists,  however,  the  newest  of  the  new  in  modern  science, 
have  not  been  slow  to  recognize  the  importance  of  his  work  on  the 
soul.  One  could  wish  that  those  who  nowadays  are  prating  in  such 
wretched  taste  about  'eugenics,'  which  they  think  has  just  been 
discovered,  were  equally  well  acquainted  with  the  Republic  of 
Plato.  It  may  be  accidental,  but  I  have  heard  very  few  American 
botanists  mention  the  fifteen  surviving  books  of  Theophrastus  on 
the  Natural  History  and  Physiology  of  Plants. 

In  general,  what  the  modern  scientist  may  learn  from  Aristotle, 
taking  him  as  the  representative  of  scientific  investigation  among 
the  ancients,  is,  first  of  all,  the  habit  of  exact  personal  observation, 
which,  as  Agassiz  knew,  is  the  corner-stone  of  science.    Secondly,  it 

«  Smith 's  Dictionary  of  Greek  and  Soman  Biography  and  Mythology  3.  254. 


INTRODUCTION  11 

is  the  method  of  research:  to  collect  as  many  examples  of  a  given 
form  as  possible — that  is,  without  expending  all  one 's  time  in  mere 
collection ;  and  to  select  from  these  the  typical  cases,  for  the  purpose 
of  comparison  and  inference.  Finally,  it  is  a  sense  of  the  relation 
of  every  part  of  science  to  the  whole,  and  a  recognition  of  the  fact 
that,  while  any  science  may  at  any  time  be  subservient  to  any  other, 
even  the  higher  to  the  lower,  still  some  sciences  in  the  long  run  are 
subordinate.  A  knowledge  of  the  habits  of  birds  and  fishes,  for 
example,  is  less  important  than  a  knowledge  of  the  characteristic 
actions  of  men. 

This  brings  us  to  the  last  trait  of  the  Greeks  that  needs  remark, 
their  scientific  interest  in  human  conduct,  which,  with  their  pro- 
found belief  in  a  First  Cause,  determined  their  attitude  to  human 
life.  To  begin  with,  we  must  not  forget  that  they  found  no  such 
opposition  as  we  seem  to  make  between  theory  and  practice,  or 
between  knowledge  and  its  application.  The  distinction  between 
theory  and  practice  we  owe,  indeed,  like  many  another  distinction, 
to  the  Greeks,  but  the  divorce  is  our  own  contrivance.  Accordingly, 
a  theoretical  knowledge  of  human,  as  of  animal,  behavior  would 
mean  to  them  the  sort  of  knowledge  that  corresponds  to  the  facts, 
arising  from  exact  observation  and  comparison  of  the  facts,  and 
enabling  one  to  deal  with  the  facts  in  a  practical  way.  They  would 
not,  for  example,  condemn  a  candidate  for  the  presidency  of  the 
United  States  on  the  ground  that  he  was  'too  theoretical';  but  if 
his  knowledge  was  one-sided  and  unfit  for  use,  they  would  say 
he  was  not  theoretical  enough,  and  hence  was  ill-prepared  to 
govern.  If  he  knew  books,  that  is,  history  in  some  narrow  sense, 
but  not  the  motives  of  men,  or  if  he  knew  Tom,  Dick,  and  Harry, 
but  not  the  vital  truths  of  history,  he  could  have  no  true  theory  of 
government,  and  so  he  would  be  likely  to  fail  as  a  leader.  With 
their  habitual  thoroughness,  then,  the  Greeks  observed  and  classi- 
fied the  various  types  of  men,  and  the  ways  in  which  men  act, 
individually  as  well  as  in  combination,  and  in  the  different  periods 
of  life.  The  powers  of  men,  resulting  in  right  action  and  happiness, 
they  called  virtues,  and  the  characteristic  lapses  from  the  normal, 
resulting  in  imperfect  action  and  absurdity  or  ruin,  they  called 
vices.  They  thus  built  up,  as  we  find  in  the  Ethics,  Rhetoric,  and 
Politics  of  Aristotle,  and  in  the  Characters  of  Theophrastus,  a 
thoroughgoing  science  of  the  types  and  ages  of  men,  of  their 
virtues  and  vices,  and  of  the  several  species  of  organization  that 
arise  when  families  combine  to  form  states.  They  described  youth, 
or  the  magnanimous  man,  or  the  coward,  or  a  democracy,  with  the 


12  LANE  COOPER 

same  precision  we  use,  and  they  too  used,  in  describing  the  natural 
history  and  physiology  of  a  plant.  The  thing  is  denned,  and  its 
mode  of  action  explained.  So  in  the  Rhetoric,  Aristotle  analyzes 
the  qualities  of  youth,  old  age,  and  middle  life,  because  the  public 
orator  will  have  men  of  each  sort  in  his  audience,  and  must  know 
what  kind  of  argument  will  gain  or  lose  their  votes.  So  in  the 
Ethics,  with  scientific  objectivity,  he  represents  the  man  of  perfect 
virtue,  the  norm  or  standard  by  which  other  men  are  to  be  judged. 
So  in  the  Characters,  Theophrastus  exhibits  the  nature  and  activity 
of  The  Flatterer,  The  Surly  Man,  The  Boor,  and  so  on,  some  thirty 
types  in  all,  who  depart  from  the  standard  set  in  the  Ethics,  treat- 
ing them  as  dispassionately  as  if  they  were  flowers.  From  what  I 
can  learn,  there  has  been  no  comparable  body  of  systematic  knowl- 
edge produced  upon  this  subject  since  the  Middle  Ages,  and  none 
on  any  part  of  it  that  is  not  either  copied  from  Greece,  or,  if  to 
some  extent  original,  inferior  to  the  work  of  Aristotle  and  Theo- 
phrastus as  a  guide  to  the  individual  in  studying  himself,  or  to  the 
leader  in  studying  his  fellows. 

Let  us  turn  to  a  few  passages  from  Greek  literature  which  may 
serve  to  illustrate  at  least  a  part  of  what  has  been  said,  and  to 
build  up,  perhaps  in  the  rough,  the  conception  I  have  thus  far 
been  trying  to  take  to  pieces.  They  represent  to  me,  either  directly 
or  by  contrast,  the  Greek  ideal  of  humanity — that  human  ideal 
which,  in  spite  of  its  limitations,  still  makes  the  classics  worth  our 
study. 

The  Greeks  conceived  of  the  ideal  man  as  one  possessing  insight 
enough  to  distinguish  between  the  sorrows  which  every  one  must 
undergo,  such  as  the  pains  attendant  upon  age  and  death,  and 
the  sorrows  which  men  bring  upon  themselves  through  folly  and 
hardness  of  heart.  Thus,  near  the  opening  of  the  Odyssey,  Homer 
puts  into  the  mouth  of  Zeus  the  following  speech  upon  the  rela- 
tions of  fate  and  free  will : 

'Lo  you  now,  how  vainly  mortal  men  do  blame  the  gods!  For  of 
us  they  say  comes  evil,  whereas  they  even  of  themselves,  through 
the  blindness  of  their  own  hearts,  have  sorrows  beyond  that  which 
is  ordained.  Even  as  of  late  Aegisthus,  beyond  that  which  was 
ordained,  took  to  him  the  wedded  wife  of  the  son  of  Atreus  and 
killed  her  lord  on  his  return,  and  that  with  sheer  doom  before  his 
eyes,  since  we  had  warned  him  by  the  embassy  of  Hermes  the 
keen-sighted,  the  slayer  of  Argos,  that  he  should  neither  kill  the 
man,  nor  woo  his  wife.    For  the  son  of  Atreus  shall  be  avenged  at 


INTRODUCTION  13 

the  hand  of  Orestes,  so  soon  as  he  shall  come  to  man's  estate  and 
long  for  his  own  country.  So  spake  Hermes,  yet  he  prevailed  not 
on  the  heart  of  Aegisthus,  for  all  his  good  will;  but  now  hath  he 
paid  one  price  for  all.  'T 

On  the  evidence  of  this  passage  at  least,  it  would  be  unsafe  to 
accuse  the  Greeks  of  fatalism.  But  such  evidence  is  not  uncommon 
in  the  Greek  poets,  if  we  are  careful  to  watch  when  their  dramatic 
characters  are  not  misled  or  purposely  deceiving,  but  are  telling 
the  ultimate  truth.  In  Sophocles'  Antigone,  for  example,  there  is 
a  similar  utterance,  made  by  the  tyrant  Creon,  when  his  eyes  are 
opened,  and  he  finds  himself,  through  his  own  misguided  action, 
bereft  of  his  wife,  and  of  Haemon,  his  son,  and  hated  of  gods  and 
men: 

'Enter  Creon,  on  the  spectators'  left,  with  attendants,  carrying 
the  shrouded  body  of  Haemon  on  a  bier. 

'Chorus.  Lo,  yonder  the  king  himself  draws  near,  bearing  that 
which  tells  too  clear  a  tale — the  work  of  no  stranger's  madness — 
if  we  may  say  it — but  of  his  own  misdeeds. 

'Creon.  Woe  for  the  sins  of  a  darkened  soul,  stubborn  sins, 
fraught  with  death!  Ah,  ye  behold  us,  the  sire  who  hath  slain, 
the  son  who  hath  perished !  Woe  is  me,  for  the  wretched  blindness 
of  my  counsels !  Alas,  my  son,  thou  hast  died  in  thy  youth,  by  a 
timeless  doom,  woe  is  me ! — thy  spirit  hath  fled — not  by  thy  folly, 
but  by  mine  own !  '8 

Creon  is  a  king,  of  noble  blood.  He  does  not  lean  to  the  worse, 
but,  as  we  should  say,  is  a  person  of  good  intentions.  Yet  in  him 
there  had  been  blindness  of  heart,  an  infatuate  self-will,  which 
recoiled  upon  himself  in  sorrows  beyond  those  which  are  ordained 
for  the  man  of  insight.  The  poet  is  clear  on  this  point.  Death, 
the  supreme  evil,  death,  which  to  the  Greek  is  not  swallowed  up  in 
victory,  is  a  thing  that  no  one  can  avoid ;  but  life  can  be  ordered 
aright,  and  man,  if  he  cleaves  to  divine  justice,  man  the  versatile, 
the  courageous,  is  for  life  the  master  of  circumstance. 

'Wonders  are  many,'  [sings  the  Chorus  in  Antigone,]  'and  none 
is  more  wonderful  than  man ;  the  power  that  crosses  the  white  sea, 
driven  by  the  stormy  south-wind,  making  a  path  under  surges 
that  threaten  to  engulf  him ;  and  Earth,  the  eldest  of  the  gods,  the 

•  Translation  by  Butcher  and  Lang,  p.  2. 

«  Jebb,  The  Tragedies  of  Sophocles,  translated  into  English  prose,  p.  169. 


14  LANE  COOPER 

immortal,  the  unwearied,  doth  he  wear,  turning  the  soil  with  the 
offspring  of  horses,  as  the  plows  go  to  and  fro  from  year  to  year. 

'And  the  light-hearted  race  of  birds,  and  the  tribes  of  savage 
beasts,  and  the  sea-brood  of  the  deep,  he  snares  in  the  meshes  of 
his  woven  toils,  he  leads  captive,  man  excellent  in  wit.  And  he 
masters  by  his  arts  the  beast  whose  lair  is  in  the  wilds,  who  roams 
the  hills;  he  tames  the  horse  of  shaggy  mane,  he  puts  the  yoke 
upon  its  neck,  he  tames  the  tireless  mountain  bull. 

'And  speech,  and  wind-swift  thought,  and  all  the  moods  that 
mould  a  state,  hath  he  taught  himself;  and  how  to  flee  the  arrows 
of  the  frost,  when  'tis  hard  lodging  under  the  clear  sky,  and  the 
arrows  of  the  rushing  rain ;  yea,  he  hath  resource  for  all ;  without 
resource  he  meets  nothing  that  must  come:  only  against  Death 
shall  he  call  for  aid  in  vain;  but  from  baffling  maladies  he  hath 
devised  escapes. 

'Cunning  beyond  fancy's  dream  is  the  fertile  skill  which  brings 
him,  now  to  evil,  now  to  good.  When  he  honors  the  laws  of  the 
land,  and  that  justice  which  he  hath  sworn  by  the  gods  to  uphold, 
proudly  stands  his  city:  no  city  hath  he  who,  for  his  rashness, 
dwells  with  sin.  Never  may  he  share  my  hearth,  never  think  my 
thoughts,  who  doth  these  things !  '9 

The  seamy  side  of  human  nature,  we  observe,  did  not  escape 
the  vision  of  the  Greeks.  As  a  further  illustration,  I  may  quote 
from  the  Politics  of  Aristotle,  which  often  has  a  bearing  upon  the 
commonest  problems  of  to-day.  Does  not  the  following  recall  the 
recent  history  of  our  laboring  classes,  with  their  successive  strikes, 
and  the  constant  growth  of  their  demands? 

'  The  avarice  of  mankind  is  insatiable ;  at  one  time  two  obols  was 
pay  enough,  but  now,  when  this  sum  has  become  customary,  men 
always  want  more  and  more  without  end ;  for  it  is  of  the  nature  of 
desire  not  to  be  satisfied,  and  most  men  live  only  for  the  gratifica- 
tion of  it.  The  beginning  of  reform  is  not  so  much  to  equalize 
property  as  to  train  the  nobler  sort  of  natures  not  to  desire  more, 
and  to  prevent  the  lower  from  getting  more;  that  is  to  say,  they 
must  be  kept  down,  but  not  ill-treated.'10 

Does  our  higher  education  in  America  school  the  nobler  sort  of 
natures  in  the  art  of  self-restraint?     Will  our  college  graduates 

»  Jebb,  The  Tragedies  of  Sophocles,  translated  into  English  prose,  pp.  138- 
139. 

io  Aristotle,  Politics,  tr.  Jowett,  2.  7. 


INTRODUCTION  15 

appreciate  the  saw  of  Hesiod,  whether  in  the  outlay  of  words  or  in 
the  acquisition  of  wealth,  that  the  half  is  more  than  the  whole? 
Can  our  emancipated  ladies  take  to  heart  the  thought  of  Nicias, 
which  he  uttered  just  before  the  dreadful  termination  of  the  siege 
at  Syracuse?  When  they  have  done  as  men  sometimes  do,  will 
they  suffer  what  men  can  bear? 

But  Greek  literature  in  general  has  an  application  to  modern 
life.  Let  us  take  at  random  one  of  the  Characters  of  Theophrastus, 
The  Complaisant  Man.  Have  we  not  met  him  in  business,  among 
traveling  salesmen,  in  our  college  halls,  and  among  professional 
politicians?    He  is  perennial. 

'The  Complaisant  Man 

1  Complaisance  may  be  denned  as  a  mode  of  address  calculated  to 
give  pleasure,  but  not  with  the  best  tendency. 

'  The  Complaisant  Man  is  very  much  the  kind  of  person  who  will 
hail  one  afar  off  with  "my  dear  fellow";  and,  after  a  large  display 
of  respect,  seize  and  hold  one  by  both  hands.  He  will  attend  you 
a  little  way,  and  ask  when  he  is  to  see  you,  and  will  take  his  leave 
with  a  compliment  upon  his  lips.  Also,  when  he  is  called  in  to  an 
arbitration,  he  will  seek  to  please,  not  only  his  principal,  but  the 
adversary  as  well,  in  order  that  he  may  be  deemed  impartial.  He 
will  say,  too,  that  foreigners  speak  more  justly  than  his  fellow- 
citizens.  Then,  when  he  is  asked  to  dinner,  he  will  request  the  host 
to  send  for  the  children ;  and  will  say  of  them,  when  they  come  in, 
that  they  are  as  like  their  father  as  figs,  and  will  draw  them  towards 
him,  and  kiss  them,  and  establish  them  at  his  side — playing  with 
some  of  them,  and  himself  saying  "Wineskin,"  "Hatchet,"  and 
permitting  others  to  go  to  sleep  upon  him,  to  his  anguish.'11 

But  we  must  hasten  to  a  close.  Without  further  preliminary,  I 
will  quote  from  the  description  of  the  Magnanimous  or  High- 
minded  Man  in  the  Nicomachean  Ethics: 

I  Highmindedness,  as  its  very  name  suggests,  seems  to  be  occupied 
with  high  things.  Let  us  begin,  then,  by  ascertaining  the  character 
of  those  things.  It  makes  no  difference  whether  we  consider  the 
moral  state  or  the  person  in  whom  the  moral  state  is  seen. 

'A  highminded  person  seems  to  be  one  who  regards  himself  as 

II  The  Characters  of  Theophrastus,  ed.  Jebb-Sandys  (1909),  pp.  43,  45. 


16  LANE  COOPER 

worthy  of  high  things,  and  who  is  worthy  of  them ;  for  he  who  does 
so  without  being  worthy  is  foolish,  and  no  virtuous  person  is  foolish 
or  absurd. 

'Such,  then,  is  the  highminded  person.  One  who  is  worthy  of 
small  things,  and  who  regards  himself  as  worthy  of  them,  is  temper- 
ate or  sensible,  but  he  is  not  highminded;  for  highmindedness  can 
only  exist  on  a  large  scale,  as  beauty  can  only  exist  in  a  tall  person. 
Small  people  may  be  elegant  and  well-proportioned,  but  not 
beautiful. 

'He  who  regards  himself  as  worthy  of  high  things,  and  is  un- 
worthy of  them,  is  conceited — although  it  is  not  every  one  who  takes 
an  exaggerated  view  of  his  own  worth  that  is  a  conceited  person. 

'He  who  takes  too  low  a  view  of  his  own  worth  is  mean-minded, 
whether  it  be  high  things,  or  moderate,  or  even  small  things  that 
he  is  worthy  of,  so  long  as  he  underrates  his  deserts.  This  would 
seem  to  be  especially  a  fault  in  one  who  is  worthy  of  high  things; 
for  what  would  he  do,  it  may  be  asked,  if  his  deserts  were  less  than 
they  are  ? 

'  The  highminded  man,  while  he  holds  an  extreme  position  by  the 
greatness  of  his  deserts,  holds  an  intermediate  .  .  .  position  by  the 
propriety  of  his  conduct,  as  he  estimates  his  own  deserts  aright, 
while  others  rate  their  deserts  too  high  or  too  low. 

'  But  if,  then,  he  regards  himself  as  worthy  of  high  things,  and  is 
worthy  of  them,  and  especially  if  he  is  worthy  of  the  highest 
things,  there  will  be  one  particular  object  of  his  interest.  Desert 
is  a  term  used  in  reference  to  external  goods,  but  we  should  nat- 
urally esteem  that  to  be  the  greatest  of  external  goods  which  we 
attribute  to  the  gods,  or  which  persons  of  high  reputation  most 
desire,  or  which  is  the  prize  awarded  to  the  noblest  actions.  But 
honor  answers  to  this  description,  as  being  the  highest  of  external 
goods. 

'The  highminded  man,  then,  bears  himself  in  a  right  spirit 
towards  honors  and  dishonors.  It  needs  no  proof  that  highminded 
people  are  concerned  with  honor;  for  it  is  honor  more  than  any- 
thing else  of  which  the  great  regard  themselves,  and  deservedly 
regard  themselves,  as  worthy.  The  mean-minded  man  underesti- 
mates himself  both  in  respect  of  his  own  deserts  and  in  comparison 
with  the  acknowledged  deserts  of  the  highminded  man.  The  con- 
ceited man  overestimates  his  own  deserts,  but  he  does  not  estimate 
his  own  deserts  more  highly  than  the  highminded  man. 

'  The  highminded  man,  as  being  worthy  of  the  highest  things,  will 
be  in  the  highest  degree  good,  for  the  better  man  is  always  worthy 


INTRODUCTION  17 

of  the  higher  things,  and  the  best  man  of  the  highest  things.  It 
follows,  then,  that  the  truly  highminded  man  must  be  good. 

'It  would  seem,  too,  that  the  highminded  man  possesses  such 
greatness  as  belongs  to  every  virtue.  It  would  be  wholly  inconsist- 
ent with  the  character  of  the  highminded  man  to  run  away  in  hot 
haste,  or  to  commit  a  crime ;  for  what  should  be  his  object  in  doing 
a  disgraceful  action,  if  nothing  is  great  in  his  eyes?  If  one  exam- 
ines the  several  points  of  character,  it  will  appear  quite  ridiculous 
to  say  that  the  highminded  man  need  not  be  good.  "Were  he  vicious, 
he  would  not  be  worthy  of  honor  at  all ;  for  honor  is  the  prize  of 
virtue,  and  is  paid  to  none  but  the  good. 

'It  seems,  then,  that  highmindedness  is,  as  it  were,  the  crown  of 
the  virtues,  as  it  enhances  them,  and  cannot  exist  apart  from  them. 
Hence  it  is  difficult  to  be  truly  highminded,  as  it  is  impossible  with- 
out the  perfection  of  good  breeding. 

'A  highminded  man,  then,  is  especially  concerned  with  honors 
and  dishonors.  He  will  be  only  moderately  pleased  at  great  honors 
conferred  upon  him  by  virtuous  people,  as  feeling  that  he  obtains 
what  is  naturally  his  due,  or  even  less  than  his  due ;  for  it  would  be 
impossible  to  devise  an  honor  that  should  be  proportionate  to  per- 
fect virtue.  Nevertheless  he  will  accept  honors,  as  people  have 
nothing  greater  to  confer  upon  him.  But  such  honor  as  is  paid  by 
ordinary  people,  and  on  trivial  grounds,  he  will  utterly  despise,  as 
he  deserves  something  better  than  this.  He  will  equally  despise 
dishonor,  feeling  that  it  cannot  justly  attach  to  him.  While  the 
highminded  man,  then,  as  has  been  said,  is  principally  concerned 
with  honors,  he  will,  at  the  same  time,  take  a  moderate  view  of 
wealth,  political  power,  and  good  or  ill  fortune  of  all  kinds,  however 
it  may  occur.  He  will  not  be  excessively  elated  by  good,  or  exces- 
sively depressed  by  ill  fortune.  .   .   . 

'The  possessors  of  such  goods  [as  power  and  wealth]  belong  to 
the  class  of  people  who  are  apt  to  become  supercilious  and  insolent ; 
for  without  virtue  it  is  not  easy  to  bear  the  gifts  of  fortune  in  good 
taste.  Not  being  able  to  bear  them,  and  imagining  themselves  to  be 
superior  to  everybody  else,  such  people  treat  others  with  contempt, 
and  act  according  to  their  own  sweet  will;  for  they  imitate  the 
highminded  man  without  being  like  him,  but  they  imitate  him  only 
so  far  as  they  have  the  power ;  in  other  words,  they  do  not  perform 
virtuous  actions,  but  they  treat  other  people  with  contempt.  The 
highminded  man  is  justified  in  his  contempt  for  others,  as  he  forms 
a  true  estimate  of  them,  but  ordinary  people  have  no  such  justifi- 
cation.   Again,  the  highminded  man  is  not  fond  of  encountering 


18  LANE  COOPER 

small  dangers,  nor  is  he  fond  of  encountering  dangers  at  all,  as 
there  are  few  things  which  he  values  enough  to  endanger  himself 
for  them.  But  he  is  ready  to  encounter  great  dangers,  and  in  the 
hour  of  danger  is  reckless  of  his  life,  because  he  feels  that  life  is 
not  worth  living  without  honor.  He  is  capable  of  conferring  bene- 
fits, but  ashamed  of  receiving  them,  as  in  the  one  case  he  feels  his 
superiority,  and  in  the  other  his  inferiority.  ...  It  is  character- 
istic, too,  of  the  highminded  man  that  he  never,  or  hardly  ever, 
asks  a  favor,  that  he  is  ready  to  do  anybody  a  service,  and  that, 
although  his  bearing  is  stately  towards  persons  of  dignity  and 
affluence,  it  is  unassuming  towards  the  middle  class.  .  .  .  Such  a  per- 
son, too,  will  not  be  eager  to  win  honors  or  to  dispute  the  supremacy 
of  other  people.  He  will  not  bestir  himself  or  be  in  a  hurry  to  act, 
except  where  there  is  some  great  honor  to  be  won,  or  some  great 
result  to  be  achieved.  His  performances  will  be  rare,  but  they  will 
be  great,  and  will  win  him  a  great  name.  He  will,  of  course,  be  open 
in  his  hatreds  and  his  friendships,  as  secrecy  is  an  indication  of 
fear.  He  will  care  for  reality  more  than  for  reputation;  he  will 
be  open  in  word  and  deed,  as  his  superciliousness  will  lead  him  to 
speak  his  mind  boldly.  Accordingly,  he  will  tell  the  truth,  too, 
except  where  he  is  ironical,  although  he  will  use  irony  in  dealing 
with  ordinary  people.  He  will  be  incapable  of  ordering  his  life 
so  as  to  please  anybody  else,  unless  it  be  a  friend.  .  .  .  Nor  again 
will  he  be  given  to  admiration,  as  there  is  nothing  which  strikes 
him  as  great.  Nor  will  he  bear  grudges;  for  no  one  who  is  high- 
minded  will  dwell  upon  the  past,  least  of  all  upon  past  injuries ;  he 
will  prefer  to  overlook  them.  He  will  not  be  a  gossip,  he  will  not 
talk  much  about  himself  or  about  anybody  else;  for  he  does  not 
care  to  be  praised  himself  or  to  get  other  people  censured.  On 
the  other  hand,  he  will  not  be  fond  of  praising  other  people.  And 
not  being  a  gossip,  he  will  not  speak  evil  of  others,  even  of  his 
enemies,  except  for  the  express  purpose  of  insulting  them.  He  will 
be  the  last  person  to  set  up  a  wailing,  or  cry  out  for  help,  when 
something  happens  which  is  inevitable  or  insignificant,  as  to  do  so 
is  to  attach  great  importance  to  it.  He  is  the  kind  of  person  who 
would  rather  possess  what  is  noble,  although  it  does  not  bring  in 
profit,  than  what  is  profitable  but  not  noble,  as  such  a  preference 
argues  self-sufficiency. 

'It  seems,  too,  that  the  highminded  man  will  be  slow  in  his 
movements,  his  voice  will  be  deep  and  his  manner  of  speaking 
sedate ;  for  it  is  not  likely  that  a  man  will  be  in  a  hurry,  if  there 


INTRODUCTION  19 

are  not  many  things  that  he  cares  for,  or  that  he  will  be  emphatic, 
if  he  does  not  regard  anything  as  important,  and  these  are  the 
causes  which  make  people  speak  in  shrill  tones  and  use  rapid 
movements. 'x2 

Is  the  picture  somewhat  harsh?  It  nevertheless  is  not  devoid 
of  a  sober  inspiration.  Here  we  behold  an  idealized  portrait  of 
the  man  who  is  fitted  to  live  a  noble  life,  as  the  Greeks  thought  of 
life ;  a  man  possessed  of  every  virtue,  and  adorning  them  all  with 
the  perfection  of  good  breeding;  self -centered,  of  course,  yet  exist- 
ing for  the  welfare  of  the  State.  It  is  not  meant  for  an  actual 
person,  though  it  is  based  upon  a  lifelong  observation  of  real  men. 
It  certainly  represents  no  definite  individual  like  Alexander,  who 
was  not  a  man  of  peace  and  did  not  live  the  life  of  contemplation, 
or,  on  the  other  hand,  like  the  philosopher  Socrates,  whose  humility, 
though  at  times  affected,  was  for  the  most  part  ingrained.  Prob- 
ably it  is  not  intended  as  a  pattern  of  complete  humanity;  for  us 
at  least  this  Magnanimous  Man  has  the  irritating,  inhuman  trick 
of  never  being  astonished  at  anything.  Possibly  it  was  not  the 
highest  single  type  of  which  its  author  could  conceive;  yet,  when 
all  is  said,  it  stands  as  a  masterpiece  of  delineation  by  the  subtlest 
student  of  mankind  to  be  found  outside  the  Christian  tradition. 
Greek  poets  now  and  then  may  elevate  a  tragic  character  above  the 
level  of  the  Magnanimous  Man,  through  the  force  of  an  imagina- 
tive insight  that  transcends  philosophy ;  but  even  in  those  poets  we 
should  not  search  for  the  loftiest  embodiments  of  faith,  or  of  hope, 
or  of  charity,  since  these  are  Christian  virtues.  This  picture  is  the 
very  incarnation  of  temperance,  prudence,  fortitude,  and  justice. 
And  ideals  of  temperance,  prudence,  fortitude,  and  justice  being 
the  special  gift  of  the  classic  to  the  modern  world,  we  shall  do  well 
to  seek  them  at  their  inexhaustible  sources. 

One  would  hardly  care  to  leave  this  subject  without  bestowing 
a  glance  on  the  relation  which  the  study  of  the  classics  bears  to 
the  interpretation  of  modern  literature.  The  simplest  way  to 
obtain  a  glimpse  of  this  important  topic  is  to  read  a  few  lines  from 
a  modern  poet  who,  in  the  directness  of  his  vision,  in  his  sensitive- 
ness, and  in  the  quality  of  self-restraint,  is  very  close  to  the  Greek 
spirit.  But  the  lines  of  Wordsworth's  Character  of  the  Happy 
Warrior  have  another  quality  in  addition,  and  betray  a  gentleness 
of  heart  which  is  not  ancient,  but  modern : 

12  The  Nicomachean  Ethics,  J.  E.  C.  Welldon's  translation,  pp.  Ill  ff. 


20  LANE  COOPER 

Who  is  the  Happy  Warrior  ?    Who  is  he 

That  every  man  in  arms  should  wish  to  he  ? 

— It  is  the  generous  spirit,  who,  when  brought 

Among  the  tasks  of  real  life,  hath  wrought 

Upon  the  plan  that  pleased  his  boyish  thought : 

Whose  high  endeavors  are  an  inward  light 

That  makes  the  path  before  him  always  bright: 

Who,  with  a  natural  instinct  to  discern 

What  knowledge  can  perform,  is  diligent  to  learn ; 

Abides  by  this  resolve,  and  stops  not  there, 

But  makes  his  moral  being  his  prime  care ; 

Who,  doomed  to  go  in  company  with  Pain, 

And  Fear,  and  Bloodshed,  miserable  train ! 

Turns  his  necessity  to  glorious  gain ; 

In  face  of  these  doth  exercise  a  power 

Which  is  our  human  nature 's  highest  dower ; 

Controls  them  and  subdues,  transmutes,  bereaves 

Of  their  bad  influence,  and  their  good  receives : 

By  objects  which  might  force  the  soul  to  abate 

Her  feeling,  rendered  more  compassionate; 

Is  placable — because  occasions  rise 

So  often  that  demand  such  sacrifice ; 

More  skilful  in  self-knowledge,  even  more  pure, 

As  tempted  more ;  more  able  to  endure, 

As  more  exposed  to  suffering  and  distress; 

Thence,  also,  more  alive  to  tenderness. 

— 'Tis  he  whose  law  is  reason;  who  depends 

Upon  that  law  as  on  the  best  of  friends; 

Whence,  in  a  state  where  men  are  tempted  still 

To  evil  for  a  guard  against  worse  ill, 

And  what  in  quality  or  act  is  best 

Doth  seldom  on  a  right  foundation  rest, 

He  labors  good  on  good  to  fix,  and  owes 

To  virtue  every  triumph  that  he  knows: 

— Who,  if  he  rise  to  station  of  command, 

Rises  by  open  means;  and  there  will  stand 

On  honorable  terms,  or  else  retire, 

And  in  himself  possess  his  own  desire ; 

Who  comprehends  his  trust,  and  to  the  same 

Keeps  faithful  with  a  singleness  of  aim; 


INTRODUCTION  21 

And  therefore  does  not  stoop,  nor  lie  in  wait 

For  wealth  or  honors,  or  for  worldly  state ; 

Whom  they  must  follow ;  on  whose  head  must  fall 

Like  showers  of  manna,  if  they  come  at  all: 

Whose  powers  shed  round  him  in  the  common  strife, 

Or  mild  concerns  of  ordinary  life, 

A  constant  influence,  a  peculiar  grace ; 

But  who,  if  he  be  called  upon  to  face 

Some  awful  moment  to  which  Heaven  has  joined 

Great  issues,  good  or  bad  for  human  kind, 

Is  happy  as  a  lover;  and  attired 

With  sudden  brightness,  like  a  man  inspired ; 

And,  through  the  heat  of  conflict,  keeps  the  law 

In  calmness  made,  and  sees  what  he  foresaw; 

Or  if  an  unexpected  call  succeed, 

Come  when  it  will,  is  equal  to  the  need : 

— He  who,  though  thus  endued  as  with  a  sense 

And  faculty  for  storm  and  turbulence, 

Is  yet  a  soul  whose  master-bias  leans 

To  homef elt  pleasures  and  to  gentle  scenes ; 

Sweet  images!  which,  wheresoe'er  he  be, 

Are  at  his  heart;  and  such  fidelity 

It  is  his  darling  passion  to  approve; 

More  brave  for  this,  that  he  hath  much  to  love : — 

'Tis,  finally,  the  man,  who,  lifted  high, 

Conspicuous  object  in  a  nation's  eye, 

Or  left  unthought-of  in  obscurity, — 

Who,  with  a  toward  or  untoward  lot, 

Prosperous  or  adverse,  to  his  wish  or  not — 

Plays,  in  the  many  games  of  life,  that  one 

Where  what  he  most  doth  value  must  be  won : 

Whom  neither  shape  of  danger  can  dismay, 

Nor  thought  of  tender  happiness  betray; 

Who,  not  content  that  former  worth  stand  fast, 

Looks  forward,  persevering  to  the  last, 

From  well  to  better,  daily  self-surpast : 

Who — whether  praise  of  him  must  walk  the  earth 

For  ever,  and  to  noble  deeds  give  birth, 

Or  he  must  fall,  to  sleep  without  his  fame, 

And  leave  a  dead  unprofitable  name — 


22  LANE  COOPER 

Finds  comfort  in  himself  and  in  his  cause ; 
And,  while  the  mortal  mist  is  gathering,  draws 
His  breath  in  confidence  of  Heaven 's  applause : 
This  is  the  Happy  "Warrior ;  this  is  he 
That  every  man  in  arms  should  wish  to  be. 

'Remember,'  said  Wordsworth  to  his  nephew,  'first  read  the 
ancient  classical  authors;  then  come  to  us;  and  you  will  be  able  to 
judge  for  yourself  which  of  us  is  worth  reading.' 


I 

FROM  HELLAS  x 
By  Percy  Bysshe  Shelley 

The  apathy  of  the  rulers  of  the  civilized  world  to  the  astonishing 
circumstance  of  the  descendants  of  that  nation  to  which  they  owe 
their  civilization,  rising  as  it  were  from  the  ashes  of  their  ruin 
[1822],  is  something  perfectly  inexplicable  to  a  mere  spectator  of 
the  shows  of  this  mortal  scene.  We  are  all  Greeks.  Our  laws,  our 
literature,  our  religion,  our  arts,  have  their  root  in  Greece.  But 
for  Greece,  Rome — the  instructor,  the  conqueror,  or  the  metropolis 
of  our  ancestors — would  have  spread  no  illumination  with  her  arms, 
and  we  might  still  have  been  savages  and  idolaters;  or,  what  is 
worse,  might  have  arrived  at  such  a  stagnant  and  miserable  state 
of  social  institution  [s]  as  China  and  Japan  possess. 

The  human  form  and  the  human  mind  attained  to  a  perfection 
in  Greece  which  has  impressed  its  image  on  those  faultless  produc- 
tions, whose  very  fragments  are  the  despair  of  modern  art,  and 
has  propagated  impulses  which  cannot  cease,  through  a  thousand 
channels  of  manifest  or  imperceptible  operation,  to  ennoble  and 
delight  mankind  until  the  extinction  of  the  race.  .   .   . 

Herald  op  Eternity.  .  .  . 

Within  the  circuit  of  this  pendent  orb 

There  lies  an  antique  region,  on  which  fell 

The  dews  of  thought  in  'the  world 's  golden  dawn 

Earliest  and  most  benign,  and  from  it  sprung 

Temples  and  cities  and  immortal  forms 

And  harmonies  of  wisdom  and  of  song, 

And  thoughts,  and  deeds  worthy  of  thoughts  so  fair. 

And  when  the  sun  of  its  dominion  failed, 

And  when  the  winter  of  its  glory  came, 

The  winds  that  stripped  it  bare  blew  on  and  swept 

[i  The  first  of  these  four  extracts  is  from  the  Preface  to  Hellas,  Shelley  '9 
Poetical  Works,  Oxford  Edition,  ed.  Hutchinson,  p.  442. — Editor.] 


24  PERCY  BYSSHE  SHELLEY 

That  dew  into  the  utmost  wildernesses 
In  wandering  clouds  of  rain  that  thawed 
The  unmaternal  bosom  of  the  North.2 

Semichorus  1 

Let  there  be  light !  said  Liberty, 

And,  like  sunrise  from  the  sea, 

Athens  arose ! — Around  her  born, 

Shone  like  mountains  in  the  morn 

Glorious  states; — and  are  they  now 

Ashes,  wrecks,  oblivion?  .    .   . 

.  .  .  Temples  and  towers, 

Citadels  and  marts,  and  they 
Who  live  and  die  there,  have  been  ours, 

And  may  be  thine,  and  must  decay ; 
But  Greece  and  her  foundations  are 
Built  below  the  tide  of  war, 
Based  on  the  crystalline  sea 
Of  thought  and  its  eternity ; 
Her  citizens,  imperial  spirits, 

Rule  the  present  from  the  past; 
On  all  this  world  of  men  inherits 

Their  seal  is  set.3 

Through  exile,  persecution,  and  despair, 
Rome  was,  and  young  Atlantis  shall  become 
The  wonder,  or  the  terror,  or  the  tomb 
Of  all  whose  step  wakes  Power  lulled  in  her  savage  lair. 
But  Greece  was  as  a  hermit-child, 

Whose  fairest  thoughts  and  limbs  were  built 
To  woman's  growth,  by  dreams  so  mild, 
She  knew  not  pain  or  guilt. 
And  now,  O  Victory,  blush !  and  Empire,  tremble 
When  ye  desert  the  free. — 
If  Greece  must  be 
A  wreck,  yet  shall  its  fragments  reassemble, 
And  build  themselves  again  impregnably 

In  a  diviner  clime, 
To  Amphionic  music  on  some  Cape  sublime, 
Which  frowns  above  the  idle  foam  of  Time.4 

[2  From  the  Prologue  to  Hellas  31-43,  ibid.,  p.  444. — Editor.] 
[a  Bellas  682-687,  692-703,  ibid.,  pp.  463-464.— Editoe.] 
[*  Bellas  992-1007,  ibid.,  pp.  470-471. — Editor.] 


II 

THE  LEGACY  OF  GREECE:  THE  LAND  AND  ITS 
PEOPLE  x 

By  John  Clarke  Stobart 

'Greece'  and  'Greek'  mean  different  things  to  different  people. 
To  the  man  in  the  street,  if  he  exists,  they  stand  for  something 
proverbially  remote  and  obscure,  as  dead  as  Queen  Anne,  as  heavy 
as  the  British  Museum.  To  the  average  finished  product  of  '  higher 
education'  in  England  they  recall  those  dog-eared  text-books  and 
grammars  which  he  put  away  with  much  relief  when  he  left  school ; 
they  waft  back  to  him  the  strangely  close  atmosphere  of  the  classical 
form-room.  The  historian,  of  course,  will  inform  us  that  all  "West- 
ern civilization  has  Greece  for  its  mother  and  nurse,  and  that  unless 
we  know  something  about  her  our  knowledge  of  the  past  must  be 
built  upon  sand.  That  is  true — only  nobody  cares  very  much  what 
historians  say,  for  they  deal  with  the  past,  and  the  past  is  dead 
and  disgusting.  To  some  cultured  folk  who  have  read  Swinburne 
(but  not  Plato)  the  notion  of  the  Greeks  presents  a  world  of  happy 
pagans,  children  of  nature,  without  any  tiresome  ideas  of  morality 
or  self-control,  sometimes  making  pretty  poems  and  statues,  but 
generally  basking  in  the  sun  without  much  on.  There  are  also 
countless  earnest  students  of  the  Bible  who  remember  what  St. 
Paul  said  about  those  Greeks  who  thought  the  Cross  foolishness  and 
those  Athenians  who  were  always  wanting  to  hear  something  new. 
St.  Paul  forgot  that  'the  Cross'  was  a  typical  Stoic  paradox.  Then 
there  are  a  vast  number  of  people  who  do  not  distinguish  between 
'Greek'  and  'classical.'  By  'classics'  they  understand  certain 
tyrannous  conventions  and  stilted  affectations  against  which  every 
free-minded  soul  longs  to  rebel.  They  distinguish  the  classical 
element  in  Milton  and  Keats  as  responsible  for  all  that  is  dull  and 
far-fetched  and  unnatural.    Classicism  repels  many  people  of  excel- 

[i  From  The  Glory  that  Was  Greece  (pp.  1-11).  London  and  New  York, 
1911.  The  selection  is  reprinted  by  permission  of  J.  B.  Lippincott,  Publishers, 
Philadelphia. — Editor.  ] 


26  J.  C.  STOBART 

lent  taste,  and  Greek  art  is  apt  to  fall  under  the  same  condemna- 
tion. It  is  only  in  the  last  generation  that  scholars  have  been  able 
to  distinguish  between  the  true  Greek  and  the  false  mist  of  classi- 
cism which  surrounds  it.  Till  then  everybody  had  to  look  at  the 
Greeks  through  Roman  and  Renaissance  spectacles,  confounding 
Pallas  with  Minerva  and  thinking  of  Greek  art  as  represented  by 
the  Apollo  Belvedere  and  the  Laocoon.  "We  are  now  able,  thanks 
to  the  labors  of  scholars  and  archaeologists,  to  see  the  Greeks  as 
they  were,  perfectly  direct,  simple,  natural,  and  reasonable,  quite 
as  antagonistic  to  classicism  as  Manet  and  Debussy  themselves. 

Lastly,  there  are  a  few  elderly  people  who  have  survived  the 
atmosphere  of  'the  classics,'  and  yet  cherish  the  idea  of  Greece  as 
something  almost  holy  in  its  tremendous  power  of  inspiration. 
These  are  the  people  who  are  actually  pleased  when  a  fragment  of 
Menander  is  unearthed  in  an  Egyptian  rubbish-heap,  or  a  fisher- 
man fishing  for  sponges  off  Cape  Matapan  finds  entangled  in  his 
net  three-quarters  of  a  bronze  idol.  And  they  are  not  all  school- 
masters, either.  Some  of  them  spend  their  time  and  money  in  dig- 
ging the  soil  of  Greece  under  a  blazing  Mediterranean  sun.  Some 
of  them  haunt  the  auction-rooms  and  run  up  a  fragment  of  pottery, 
or  a  marble  head  without  a  nose,  to  figures  that  seem  quite  absurd 
when  you  look  at  the  shabby  clothes  of  the  bidders.  They  talk  of 
Greece  as  if  it  were  in  the  same  latitude  as  heaven,  not  Naples. 
The  strange  thing  about  them  is  that,  though  they  evidently  feel 
the  love  of  old  Greece  burning  like  a  flame  in  their  hearts,  they  find 
their  ideas  on  the  subject  quite  incommunicable.  Let  us  hope  they 
end  their  days  peacefully  in  retreats  with  classical  facades,  like 
the  Bethlehem  Hospital. 

Admitting  something  of  this  weakness,  it  is  my  aim  here  to 
try  and  throw  some  fresh  light  upon  the  secret  of  that  people's 
greatness,  and  to  look  at  the  Greeks,  not  as  the  defunct  producers  of 
antique  curios,  but,  if  I  can,  as  Keats  looked  at  them,  believing 
what  he  said  of  Beauty,  that 

It  will  never 
Pass  into  nothingness,  but  still  will  keep 
A  bower  quiet  for  us,  and  a  sleep 
Full  of  sweet  dreams,  and  health,  and  quiet  breathing. 

It  cannot  be  done  by  studying  their  history  only.  Their  history 
must  be  full  of  battles,  in  which  they  were  only  moderately  great, 
and  petty  quarrels,  to  which  they  were  immoderately  prone.  Their 
literature,  which  presents  the  greatest  bulk  of  varied  excellence 


THE  LEGACY  OF  GREECE  27 

of  any  literature  in  the  world,  must  be  considered.  But  as  it  can 
only  reach  us  through  the  watery  medium  of  translation,  we  must 
supplement  it  by  studying  also  their  statues  and  temples,  their 
coins,  vases,  and  pictures.  Even  that  will  not  be  sufficient  for 
people  who  are  not  artists,  because  the  sensible  Philistine  part  of 
the  world  knows,  as  the  Greeks  knew,  that  a  man  may  draw  and 
fiddle  and  be  a  scoundrel.  Therefore  we  must  look  also  at  their 
laws  and  governments,  their  ceremonies  and  amusements,  their 
philosophy  and  religion,  to  see  whether  they  knew  how  to  live  like 
gentlemen  and  freemen.  If  we  can  keep  our  eyes  open  to  all  these 
sides  of  their  activity,  and  watch  them  in  the  germ  and  bud,  we 
ought  to  get  near  to  understanding  their  power  as  a  living  source 
of  inspiration  to  artists  and  thinkers.  Lovers  of  the  classics  are 
very  apt  to  remind  us  of  the  Renaissance  as  testifying  the  power 
of  Greek  thought  to  awaken  and  inspire  men's  minds.  Historically 
they  are  right,  for  it  is  a  fact  which  ought  to  be  emphasized.  But 
when  they  go  on  to  argue  that  if  we  forget  the  classics  we  ourselves 
shall  need  a  fresh  Renaissance,  they  are  making  a  prophecy  which 
seems  to  me  to  be  very  doubtful.  I  believe  that  our  art  and  litera- 
ture has  by  this  time  absorbed  and  assimilated  what  Greece  had 
to  teach,  and  that  our  roots  are  so  entwined  with  the  soil  of  Greek 
culture  that  we  can  never  lose  the  taste  of  it  as  long  as  books  are 
read  and  pictures  painted.  "We  are,  in  fact,  living  on  the  legacy  of 
Greece,  and  we  may,  if  we  please,  forget  the  testatrix. 

My  claim  for  the  study  of  Hellenism  would  not  be  founded  on 
history.  I  would  urge  the  need  of  constant  reference  to  some 
fixed  canon  in  matters  of  taste,  some  standard  of  the  beautiful 
which  shall  be  beyond  question  or  criticism;  all  the  more  because 
we  are  living  in  eager,  restless  times  of  constant  experiment  and 
veering  fashions.  Whatever  may  be  the  philosophical  basis  of 
aesthetics,  it  is  undeniable  that  a  large  part  of  our  idea  of  beauty 
rests  upon  habit.  Hellas  provides  a  thousand  objects  which 
seventy-five  generations  of  people  have  agreed  to  call  beautiful, 
and  which  no  person  outside  a  madhouse  has  ever  thought  ugly. 
The  proper  use  of  true  classics  is  not  to  regard  them  as  fetishes 
which  must  be  slavishly  worshiped,  as  the  French  dramatists  wor- 
shiped the  imaginary  unities  of  Aristotle,  but  to  keep  them  for  a 
compass  in  the  cross-currents  of  fashion.  By  them  you  may  know 
what  is  permanent  and  essential  from  what  is  showy  and  exciting. 
That  Greek  work  is  peculiarly  suited  to  this  purpose  is  partly  due, 
no  doubt,  to  the  winnowing  of  centuries  of  time,  but  partly  also 
to  its  own  intrinsic  qualities.     For  one  thing,  all  the  best  Greek 


28  J.  C.  STOBART 

work  was  done,  not  to  please  private  tastes,  but  in  a  serious  spirit 
of  religion  to  honor  the  god  of  the  city ;  that  prevents  it  from  being 
trivial  or  meretricious.  Secondly,  it  is  not  romantic;  and  that 
renders  it  a  very  desirable  antidote  to  modern  extravagances. 
Thirdly,  it  is  idealistic ;  that  gives  it  a  force  and  permanence  which 
things  designed  only  for  the  pleasure  of  the  moment  must  generally 
lack.  "With  all  these  high  merits,  it  might  remain  very  dull,  if  it 
had  not  the  charm  and  grace  of  youth  perfectly  fearless,  and 
serving  a  religion  which  largely  consisted  in  health  and  beauty. 

The  Land  and  Its  People 

A  glance  at  the  physical  map  of  Greece  shows  you  the  sort  of 
country  which  forms  the  setting  of  our  picture.  You  see  its  long 
and  complicated  coast  line,  its  intricate  system  of  rugged  hills,  and 
the  broken  strings  of  islands  which  they  fling  off  into  the  sea  in 
every  direction.  On  the  map  it  recalls  the  features  of  Scotland  or 
Norway.  It  hangs  like  a  jewel  on  a  pendant  from  the  south  of 
Europe  into  the  Mediterranean  Sea.  Like  its  sister  peninsulas  of 
Italy  and  Spain,  it  has  high  mountains  to  the  north  of  it;  but  the 
Balkans  do  not,  as  do  the  Alps  and  Pyrenees,  present  the  form  of 
a  sheer  rampart  against  northern  invaders.  On  the  contrary,  the 
main  axis  of  the  hills  lies  in  the  same  direction  as  the  peninsula 
itself,  with  a  northwest  and  southeast  trend,  so  that  on  both  coasts 
there  are  ancient  trade  routes  into  the  country;  but  on  both  sides 
they  have  to  traverse  passes  which  offer  a  fair  chance  of  easy 
defence. 

The  historian,  wise  after  the  event,  deduces  that  the  history  of 
such  a  country  must  lie  upon  the  sea.  It  is  a  sheltered,  hospitable 
sea,  with  chains  of  islands  like  stepping-stones  inviting  the  timid 
mariner  of  early  times  to  venture  across  it.  You  can  sail  from 
Greece  to  Asia  without  ever  losing  sight  of  land.  On  the  west  it  is 
not  so.  Greece  and  Italy  turn  their  backs  upon  one  another.  Their 
neighboring  coasts  are  the  harborless  ones.  So  Greece  looks  east 
and  Italy  west,  in  history  as  well  as  geography.  The  natural 
affinities  of  Greece  are  with  Asia  Minor  and  Egypt. 

A  sea-going  people  will  be  an  adventurous  people  in  thought  as 
well  as  action.  The  Greeks  themselves  fully  realized  this.  When 
Themistocles  was  urging  his  fellow- Athenians  to  build  a  great 
fleet  and  take  to  the  sea  in  earnest,  opposition  came  from  the  con- 
servatives, who  feared  the  political  influence  of  a  'nautical  mob' 
with  radical  and  impious  tendencies.    The  type  of  solid  conservative 


THE  LEGACY  OF  GREECE  29 

was  the  heavy-armed  land  soldier.  So  in  Greek  history  the  inland 
city  of  Sparta  stands  for  tradition,  discipline,  and  stability,  while 
the  mariners  of  Athens  are  progressive,  turbulent,  inquiring  ideal- 
ists. 

This  sea  will  also  invite  commerce  if  the  Greeks  have  anything  to 
sell.  It  does  not  look  as  if  they  will  have  much.  A  few  valleys  and 
small  plains  are  fertile  enough  to  feed  their  own  proprietors,  but  as 
regards  corn  and  foodstuffs  Greece  will  have  to  be  an  importer,  not 
an  exporter.  In  history  we  find  great  issues  hanging  on  the 
sea  routes  by  which  corn  came  in  from  the  Black  Sea.  Wine  and 
olive  oil  are  the  only  things  that  nature  allowed  Greece  to  export. 
As  for  minerals,  Athens  is  rich  in  her  silver  mines,  and  gold  is  to 
be  found  in  Thrace  under  Mount  Pangaeus.  But  if  Greece  is  to 
grow  rich,  it  will  have  to  be  through  the  skill  of  her  incomparable 
craftsmen  and  the  shield  and  spear  of  her  hoplites. 

The  map  will  help  to  explain  another  feature  of  her  history. 
Although  at  first  sight  the  peninsula  looks  as  if  it  possessed  a 
geographical  unity,  yet  a  second  glance  shows  that  nature  has  split 
it  up  into  numberless  small  plains  and  valleys  divided  from  one 
another  by  sea  and  mountain.  Such  a  country,  as  we  see  in  Wales, 
Switzerland,  and  Scotland,  encourages  a  polity  of  clans  and  can- 
tons, each  jealous  of  its  neighbor  over  the  hill,  and  each  cherishing 
a  fierce  local  patriotism.  Nature,  moreover,  has  provided  each 
plain  with  its  natural  citadel.  Greece  and  Italy  are  both  rich  in 
these  self-made  fortresses.  The  traveler  in  Italy  is  familiar  with 
the  low  hills  or  spurs  of  mountains,  each  crowned  with  the  white 
walls  of  some  ancient  city.  If  ever  geography  made  history,  it  was 
where  those  flat-topped  hills  with  precipitous  sides,  such  as  the 
Acropolis  of  Athens  and  Acrocorinthus,  invited  man  to  build  his 
fortress  and  his  shrine  upon  their  summit.  Then,  perched  safely 
on  the  hill-top  and  ringed  with  her  wall,  the  city  was  able  to  develop 
her  peculiar  civilization  even  in  troubled  times  while  the  rest  of 
the  world  was  still  immersed  in  warfare  and  barbarism.  The 
farmer  spends  the  summer  in  the  plain  below  for  sowing  and 
reaping,  the  mariner  puts  out  from  harbor,  the  soldier  marches  out 
for  a  summer  campaign,  but  the  city  is  their  home,  their  refuge, 
and  the  centre  of  their  patriotism.  We  must  not  overrate  the 
importance  of  this  natural  cause.  Even  the  plains  of  Greece,  such 
as  Thessaly  and  Boeotia,  never  developed  a  unity.  There,  too,  the 
citadel  and  the  city-state  prevailed.  Geography  is  seldom  more 
than  a  contributory  cause,  shaping  and  assisting  historical  ten- 
dencies ;  but  in  this  case  it  is  impossible  to  resist  the  belief  that  in 


30  J.  C.  STOBART 

Italy  and  Greece  the  hill-top  invited  the  wall,  and  the  wall  enabled 
the  civilization  of  the  city-state  to  rise  and  flourish  long  in  advance 
of  the  rest  of  Europe. 

Greece  enjoys  a  wonderful  climate.  The  summer  sun  is  hot, 
but  morning  and  evening  bring  refreshing  breezes  from  the  sea. 
The  rain  average  is  low  and  regular;  snow  is  almost  unknown  in 
the  valleys.  Hence  there  is  a  peculiar  dry  brightness  in  the  atmos- 
phere which  seems  to  annihilate  distance.  The  traveler  is  struck 
with  the  small  scale  of  Greek  geography.  The  Corinthian  Gulf, 
for  instance,  which  he  remembers  to  have  been  the  scene  of  famous 
sea  battles  in  history,  looks  as  if  you  could  throw  a  stone  across  it. 
From  your  hotel  window  in  Athens  you  can  see  hill-tops  in  the 
heart  of  the  Peloponnese.  Doubtless  this  clearness  of  the  atmos- 
phere encouraged  the  use  of  color  and  the  plastic  arts  for  outdoor 
decoration.  Even  to-day  the  ruined  buildings  of  the  Athenian 
citadel  shine  across  to  the  eyes  of  the  seafarers  five  miles  away  at 
the  Piraeus.  Time  has  mellowed  their  marble  columns  to  a  rich 
amber,  but  in  old  days  they  blazed  with  color  and  gilding.  In 
that  radiant  sea  air  the  Greeks  of  old  learned  to  see  things  clearly. 
They  could  live,  as  the  Greeks  still  live,  a  simple,  temperate  life. 
"Wine  and  bread,  with  a  relish  of  olives  or  pickled  fish,  satisfied  the 
bodily  needs  of  the  richest.  The  climate  invited  an  open-air  life, 
as  it  still  does.  To-day,  as  of  old,  the  Greek  loves  to  meet  his 
neighbors  in  the  market  square  and  talk  eternally  over  all  things 
both  in  heaven  and  earth.  Though  the  blood  of  Greece  has  suffered 
many  admixtures  and  though  Greece  has  had  to  submit  to  centuries 
of  conquest  by  many  masters  and  oppressors,  her  racial  character  is 
little  changed  in  some  respects.  The  Greek  is  still  restless,  talka- 
tive, subtle,  and  inquisitive,  eager  for  liberty  without  the  sense  of 
discipline  which  liberty  requires,  contemptuous  of  strangers  and 
jealous  of  his  neighbor.  In  commerce,  when  he  has  the  chance,  his 
quick  and  supple  brain  still  makes  him  the  prince  of  traders. 
Honesty  and  stability  have  always  been  qualities  which  he  is 
quicker  to  admire  than  to  practise.  Courage,  national  pride,  intel- 
lectual self-restraint,  and  creative  genius  have  undoubtedly  suf- 
fered under  the  Turkish  domination.  But  the  friends  of  modern 
Greece  believe  that  a  few  generations  of  liberty  will  restore  these 
qualities  which  were  so  eminent  in  her  ancestors,  and  that  her 
future  may  rival  her  past.  Not  in  the  field  of  action,  perhaps.  We 
must  never  forget,  when  we  praise  the  artistic  and  intellectual 
genius  of  Greece,  that  she  alone  rolled  back  the  tide  of  Persian 
conquest  at  Marathon  and  Salamis,  or  that  Greek  troops  under 


THE  LEGACY  OF  GREECE  31 

Alexander  marched  victoriously  over  half  the  known  world.  But 
it  is  not  in  the  field  of  action  that  her  greatness  lies.  She  won 
battles  by  superior  discipline,  superior  strategy,  and  superior 
armor.  As  soon  as  she  had  to  meet  a  race  of  born  soldiers,  in  the 
Romans,  she  easily  succumbed.  Her  methods  of  fighting  were 
always  defensive  in  the  main.  Historians  have  often  gone  astray  in 
devoting  too  much  attention  to  her  wars  and  battles. 

The  great  defect  of  the  climate  of  modern  Greece  is  the  malaria 
which  haunts  her  plains  and  lowlands  in  early  autumn.  This  is 
partly  the  effect  and  partly  the  cause  of  undrained  and  sparsely 
populated  marsh-lands  like  those  of  Boeotia.  It  need  not  have  been 
so  in  early  Greek  history.  There  must  have  been  more  agriculture 
and  more  trees  in  ancient  than  in  modern  Greece.  An  interesting 
and  ingenious  theory  has  lately  been  advanced  which  would  trace 
the  beginning  of  malaria  in  Greece  to  the  fourth  century.  Its 
effect  is  seen  in  the  loss  of  vigor  which  begins  in  that  period  and  the 
rapid  shrinkage  of  population  which  marks  the  beginning  of  the 
downfall  in  that  and  the  succeeding  century.  In  Italy  the  same 
theory  has  even  better  attestation,  for  the  Roman  Campagna,  which 
to-day  lies  desolate  and  fever-stricken,  was  once  the  site  of  populous 
cities  and  the  scene  of  agricultural  activity. 

The  scenery  of  Greece  is  singularly  impressive.  Folded  away 
among  the  hills  there  are,  indeed,  some  lovely  wooded  valleys,  like 
Tempe,  but  in  general  it  is  a  treeless  country,  and  the  eye  enjoys, 
in  summer  at  least,  a  pure  harmony  of  brown  hills  with  deep  blue 
sea  and  sky.  The  sea  is  indigo,  almost  purple,  and  the  traveler 
quickly  sees  the  justice  of  Homer's  epithet  of  'wine-dark.'  Those 
brown  hills  make  a  lovely  background  for  the  play  of  light  and 
shade.  Dawn  and  sunset  touch  them  with  warmer  colors,  and  the 
plain  of  Attica  is  seen  'violet-crowned'  by  the  famous  heights  of 
Hymettus,  Pentelicus,  and  Parnes.  The  ancient  Greek  talked  little 
of  scenery,  but  he  saw  a  nereid  in  every  pool,  a  dryad  under  every 
oak,  and  heard  the  pipe  of  Pan  in  the  caves  of  his  limestone  hills. 
He  placed  the  choir  of  Muses  on  Mount  Helicon,  and,  looking  up  to 
the  snowy  summit  of  Olympus,  he  peopled  it  with  calm,  benignant 
deities. 

In  this  beautiful  land  lived  the  happy  and  glorious  people  whose 
culture  we  are  now  to  study.  Some  modernists,  indeed,  smitten 
with  the  megalomania  of  to-day,  profess  to  despise  a  history  writ- 
ten on  so  small  a  scale.  Truly  Athens  was  a  small  state  at  the 
largest.  Her  little  empire  had  a  yearly  revenue  of  about  £100,000. 
It  is  doubtful  whether  Sparta  ever  had  much  more  than  ten  thou- 


32  J.  C.  STOBART 

sand  free  citizens.  In  military  matters,  it  must  be  confessed,  the 
importance  attached  by  historians  to  miniature  fleets  and  pygmy 
armies,  with  a  ridiculously  small  casualty  list,  does  strike  the 
reader  with  a  sense  of  disproportion.  But  for  the  politician  it  is 
especially  instructive  to  see  his  problems  worked  out  upon  a  small 
scale,  with  the  issues  comparatively  simple  and  the  results  plainly 
visible.  The  task  of  combining  liberty  with  order  is  in  essentials 
the  same  for  a  state  of  ten  thousand  citizens  as  for  one  of  forty 
millions.  And  in  the  realms  of  philosophy  and  art  considerations 
of  size  do  not  affect  us,  except  to  make  us  marvel  that  these  tiny 
states  could  do  so  much. 

To  a  great  extent  we  may  find  the  key  to  the  Greek  character 
in  her  favorite  proverb,  'No  excess,'  in  which  are  expressed  her 
favorite  virtues  of  aidos  and  sophrosune — reverence  and  self- 
restraint.  'Know  thyself  was  the  motto  inscribed  over  her  prin- 
cipal shrine.  Know  and  rely  upon  thine  own  powers,  know  and 
regard  thine  own  limitations.  It  was  such  a  maxim  as  this  which 
enabled  the  Greeks  to  reach  their  goal  of  perfection  even  in  the 
sphere  of  art,  where  perfection  is  proverbially  impossible.  They 
were  bold  in  prospecting  and  experimenting,  until  they  found 
what  they  deemed  to  be  the  right  way,  and  when  they  had  found 
it,  they  followed  it  through  to  its  conclusion.  Eccentricity  they 
hated  like  poison.  Though  they  were  such  great  originators,  they 
cared  nothing  for  the  modern  fetish  of  originality. 

In  politics  also  they  looked  for  a  definite  goal  and  traveled  cour- 
ageously along  to  find  it.  Herein  they  met  with  disastrous  failures 
which  are  full  of  teaching  for  us.  But  they  reached,  it  may  be 
said,  the  utmost  possibility  of  the  city-state.  The  city-state  was, 
as  we  have  seen,  probably  evolved  by  natural  survival  from  the 
physical  conditions  of  the  country.  Being  established,  it  entailed 
certain  definite  consequences.  It  involved  a  much  closer  bond  of 
social  union  than  any  modern  territorial  state.  Its  citizens  felt 
the  unity  and  exclusiveness  of  a  club  or  school.  A  much  larger 
share  of  public  rights  and  duties  naturally  fell  upon  them.  They 
looked  upon  their  city  as  a  company  of  unlimited  liability  in  which 
each  individual  citizen  was  a  shareholder.  They  expected  their 
city  to  feed  and  amuse  them.  They  expected  to  divide  the  plunder 
when  she  made  conquests,  as  they  were  certain  to  share  the  conse- 
quences if  she  was  defeated.  Every  full  citizen  of  proper  age  was 
naturally  bound  to  fight  personally  in  the  ranks,  and  from  that 
duty  his  rights  as  a  citizen  followed  logically.  He  must  naturally 
be  consulted  about  peace  and  war,  and  must  have  a  voice  in  for- 


THE  LEGACY  OF  GREECE  33 

eign  policy.  Also,  if  he  was  to  be  a  competent  soldier  he  must 
undergo  proper  education  and  training  for  it.  There  will  be  little 
privacy  inside  the  walls  of  a  city-state;  the  arts  and  crafts  will 
be  under  public  patronage.  Inequalities  will  become  hatefully 
apparent. 

But  for  us,  an  imperial  people,  who  have  inherited  a  vast  and 
scattered  dominion  which  somehow  or  other  has  got  to  be  managed 
and  governed,  the  chief  interest  will  centre  in  the  question  of  how 
these  city-states  acquired  and  administered  their  empires.  Above 
all,  it  is  to  Athens  and  perhaps  Rome  alone  that  we  can  look  for 
historical  answers  to  the  great  riddle  for  which  we  cannot  yet  boast 
of  having  discovered  a  solution — whether  democracy  can  govern  an 
empire. 

In  Greek  history  alone  we  have  at  least  three  examples  of 
empires.  Athens  and  Sparta  both  proceeded  to  acquire  empire  by 
the  road  of  alliance  and  hegemony,  Athens  being  naval  and  demo- 
cratic, Sparta  aristocratic  and  military.  Both  were  despotic,  and 
both  failed  disastrously  for  different  reasons.  Then  we  have  the 
career  of  Alexander  the  Great  and  his  short-lived  but  important 
empire,  a  career  providing  a  type  for  Caesar  and  Napoleon,  an 
empire  founded  on  mere  conquest. 

Lastly,  on  the  same  small  canvas,  we  have  a  momentous  phase 
of  the  eternal  and  still-continuing  conflict  between  East  and  West 
and  their  respective  habits  of  civilization. 


Ill 

EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY1 

By  Francis  G.  Allinson  and  Anne  C.  E.  Allinson 

It  must  not  be  assumed  from  the  smallness  of  the  land  that  the 
spurs  to  the  imagination  of  the  Greeks  were  few.  On  the  con- 
trary, within  their  narrow  borders  nature  was  prodigal  of  her 
inspiration.  In  the  few  miles  from  Thessaly  to  the  Messenian 
Gulf  are  offered  a  variety  of  climate  and  an  alternation  of  products 
well-nigh  unparalleled  for  such  a  limited  area.  The  warm  air  of 
the  sea  penetrating  into  sheltered  valleys  favors  an  almost  tropical 
vegetation,  while  the  lofty  mountain  ridges  offer  almost  an  Alpine 
climate.  In  Attica,  in  early  spring,  snow  may  occasionally  be  seen 
sprinkled  on  Hymettus,  and  glistening  white  on  Mount  Pentelicus, 
while  oranges  hang  on  the  trees  in  Athens.  Taygetus  in  the  south 
may  be  a  snow-covered  mountain  even  as  late  as  May,  while  in  the 
Messenian  plain  below  grows  the  palm  and,  more  rarely,  the  edible 
date.  In  the  Argolis  are  groves  of  lemons  and  oranges,  and  in 
Naxos,  in  the  same  latitude  as  Sparta,  the  tender  lime  ripens  in 
the  gardens.  The  gray-green  olive  is  familiar  throughout  central 
and  southern  Greece.  If  we  extend  the  survey  farther  north,  the 
beeches  of  the  Pindus  range,  west  of  Thessaly,  are  surrounded  by  the 
vegetation  rather  of  northern  Europe ;  in  the  interior  of  Thessaly 
the  olive  tree  does  not  flourish;  the  northern  shores  of  the  Aegean 
have  the  climate  of  central  Germany,  while  Mount  Athos,  whose 
marble  walls  jut  far  out  into  the  Aegean  and  rise  6400  feet  above 
the  sea,  offers  on  its  slopes  nearly  all  species  of  European  trees  in 
succession. 

The  different  parts  of  Greece  offer  a  varying  development  in 
literature.  In  this  particular,  some  districts,  like  Acarnania, 
Aetolia,  and  Achaea,  though  possessed  of  great  natural  beauty,  are 
negligible.  Arcadia,  though  itself  unproductive,  inspired  poetry; 
others,  also,  like  Phocis,  Locris,  and  Messenia,  are  inevitably  drawn 

[i  From  Greek  Lands  and  Letters  (pp.  12-31).  Boston  and  New  York,  1909. 
The  selection  is  reprinted  by  permission  of  the  publishers,  Houghton  Mifflin 
Company. — Editor.  ] 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY  35 

into  the  associations  of  literature  and  history.  In  Epirus  we  find 
at  Dodona  the  first  known  sanctuary  of  Zeus,  the  supreme  god  of 
the  Greeks.  In  Thessaly  the  earliest  Greeks,  or  Achaeans,  may 
have  first  forged  in  the  fire  of  their  young  imagination  the  tem- 
pered steel  of  the  hexameter.  Here  was  the  home  of  Achilles,  and 
here,  perhaps,  we  must  look  for  the  kernel  of  the  Iliad.  Here  most 
fitly,  close  to  Olympus  where  dwelt  the  immortals,  could  the  sons 
of  men  be  'near-gods.' 

From  the  north  and  northwest  successive  waves  of  population 
descended  into  lower  Greece  to  conquer,  merge  with,  or  become 
subject  to,  the  previous  comers.  But  prehistoric  peoples,  whether 
alien  or  Greek,  like  the  Eteo-Cretans,  the  Pelasgi,  the  Minyae,  the 
Leleges,  the  Hellenes,  the  Achaeans,  and  even  great  movements  like 
the  Dorian  and  Ionian  migrations,  are  all  foreshortened  on  a  scenic 
background,  as  equidistant  to  the  Greeks  of  the  classic  periods  as 
is  the  vault  of  heaven  to  the  eyes  of  children.  One  star,  indeed, 
differed  from  another.  The  Dorian,  for  example,  was  of  the  first 
magnitude.  But  the  relations  of  apparent  magnitude  and  real 
distance  were  ignored  or  naively  confused  in  the  fanciful  constella- 
tions of  myth  and  saga,  distant  yet  ever  present,  bending  around 
them  to  their  explored  horizon.  Heroic  figures,  impalpable  but 
real  as  the  gods  themselves,  intervened  continually,  controlling 
decisions,  shaping  policies,  or  determining  disputed  boundaries, 
among  even  the  most  intellectual  of  the  Greeks.  Royalty,  oligarchy, 
democracy,  and  tyranny  alike  must  reckon  with  personified  tradi- 
tion. 

When  we  emerge  into  the  light  of  more  authentic  records,  it  is 
well,  in  the  confusing  maze  of  inter-cantonal  contentions,  to  focus 
the  mind,  for  the  purpose  of  appreciating  the  literature,  upon 
certain  broader  relations  and  more  clearly  defined  epochs  in  Greek 
history,  like  the  so-called  'Age  of  the  Despots'  within  the  seventh 
and  sixth  centuries,  the  Persian  wars,  and  the  conflicts  between 
Attica  as  a  pivot  and  the  Peloponnese,  Thebes,  and  Macedon. 

It  might  be  expected  from  the  variety  of  natural  charm  offered 
by  Hellenic  lands,  from  Ilium  to  Sicily,  from  Mount  Olympus  to 
Crete,  that  the  Greeks  would  show  in  their  literature  a  pervasive 
love  of  nature.  This  was,  in  fact,  the  case.  The  modern  eye  has 
not  been  the  first  to  discover  the  beauty  of  form  and  color  in  the 
Greek  flowers  and  birds,  mountain,  sky,  and  sea.  Modern  critics, 
ignoring  all  historical  perspective,  and  assuming  as  a  procrustean 
standard  the  one-sided  and  sophisticated  attitude  that  has  played 
a  leading  role  in  modern  literature,  announced  as  axiomatic  that 


36  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

ancient  Greek  poets  had  no  feeling  for  nature  and  found  no  pleas- 
ure in  looking  at  the  beauties  of  a  landscape.  This  superficial  idea 
still  keeps  cropping  up,  although  thoughtful  readers  of  Greek  liter- 
ature have  long  since  pointed  out  the  necessity  both  of  a  chronologi- 
cal analysis  of  the  literature  and  of  a  more  inclusive  statement  of 
the  various  forms  in  which  a  sentiment  for  the  natural  world  is 
evinced.2  It  is  a  far  cry  from  Homer  to  Theocritus,  and,  as  might 
well  be  expected  in  a  range  of  six  centuries  and  more,  new  elements 
appear  from  time  to  time,  due  both  to  changing  conditions  of  life 
and  civilization  and  also  to  the  personal  equation. 

A  naive  feeling  for  nature  is  uppermost  in  the  descriptive  com- 
parisons and  similes  of  Homer  and,  generally  speaking,  in  the  myth- 
making  of  the  Greeks.  The  concrete  embodiment  of  natural  phenom- 
ena and  objects  in  some  nature-divinity  often  obviated  the  neces- 
sity for  elaborate  description,  and  summarized  their  conceptions  as 
if  by  an  algebraic  formula.  The  mystical  element  was  not  lacking, 
but  by  this  myth-making  process  it  became  objective  and  real. 
The  sympathetic  feeling  for  nature  becomes  more  and  more  appar- 
ent in  lyric  poetry  and  the  drama  until  in  Euripides  there  emerges, 
almost  suddenly,  the  'modern'  romanticism.  In  the  Hellenistic  and 
imperial  times,  finally,  the  sentimental  element  is  natural  to  men 
who  turn  to  the  country  for  relief  from  the  stress  of  life  in  a  city. 
One  generalization  for  the  classic  periods  may  be  safely  made. 
Although  the  Greeks  from  Homer  to  Euripides  thought  of  the 
world  as  the  environment  of  man,  yet  they  stopped  short  of  a 
sentimental  self-analysis.  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  more  than  thirty 
years  ago,  pointed  out  that  the  expression  of  a  sentiment  like 
"Wordsworth 's — 

,   To  me  the  meanest  flower  that  blows  can  give 
Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears — 

is  foreign  to  the  clear-eyed  Hellene,  reared  amongst  the  distinct 
outlines  of  his  mountains,  and  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave  at  home 
upon  the  blue  and  wind-swept  Aegean.  Certainly  this  is  true  until 
the  speculative  questionings  of  the  Ionic  philosophers  had  time  to 
react  upon  literature.  As  the  Greeks  accepted  their  pedigrees  from 
the  gods  and  heroes,  so  they  accepted  their  environment  of  beauty. 
They  were  not  unlike  the  child,  content  to  betray  by  a  stray  word 
or  caress  his  unanalyzed  admiration  for  his  mother's  face. 

Emphasis  has  often  been  laid,  and  rightly,  upon  the  keen  sensi- 

2  Cf.  Fairclough,  The  Attitude  of  the  Greek  Tragedians  toward  Nature. 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY     37 

tiveness  of  the  Greeks  to  beauty  of  form  in  sculpture,  architecture, 
and  literature.  It  is  urged  that  they  made  this  sense  of  form  and 
proportion  so  paramount  that  they  were  blind  to  the  beauty  of 
coloring,  and  indifferent  to  the  prodigal  variety  of  nature's  com- 
positions. It  may  be  readily  admitted  that  this  is  a  vital  distinction 
between  the  ancient  and  modern  attitudes.  Both  the  craving  for 
perfection  of  form  and  the  preference  given  to  man  before  nature 
come  out  in  the  pre-eminent  development  of  sculpture  by  the  Greeks. 
Their  admiration  of  the  beauty  of  the  human  form,  unlike  the  sensi- 
tive shrinking  of  moderns,  was  extended  even  to  the  lifeless  body. 
Aeschylus  speaks  of  the  warriors  who  have  found  graves  before 
Troy  as  still  '  fair  of  form. ' 

But  a  prevailing  tendency  does  not  necessarily  exclude  other 
elements.  However  meagre  the  vocabulary  of  the  Greeks  in  sharp 
distinction  of  shades  of  color,  their  love  for  a  bright  color-scheme 
is  shown  not  only  by  the  brilliancy  of  their  clothing  and  their  use 
of  coloring  in  statuary  and  architecture — for  even  in  these  mere 
form  was  not  enough — but  in  unnumbered  expressions  like  Ale- 
man's  'sea-purple  bird  of  the  springtime.' 

A  few  of  the  more  obvious  passages,  illustrating  the  Greek  atti- 
tude toward  nature,  are  here  given  in  general  historic  sequence. 
.  .  .  Very  often  such  references  are  casual  and  subordinate  to 
some  controlling  idea,  but  they  none  the  less  reflect  habitual  obser- 
vation. Even  when  we  speak  of  Homeric  'tags,'  like  the  'saffron- 
robed'  or  'rosy-fingered,'  or  of  Sappho's  'golden-sandaled'  Dawn, 
as  'standing  epithets,'  we  are  implying  that  these  epithets  made 
a  general  appeal.  The  naive  insertions  in  Homer  of  comparisons 
drawn  from  birds  and  beasts,  from  night  and  storm  and  other 
familiar  elements  of  nature,  would  seem  like  an  intrusive  delay 
of  the  story,  did  they  not  carry  with  them  the  conviction  that  both 
poet  and  hearers  alike  were  well  content  to  linger  by  the  way  and 
observe  the  objects  of  daily  life  indoors  and  out.  Thus  in  the 
Odyssey: 

'The  lion  mountain-bred,  with  eyes  agleam,  fares  onward  in  the 
rain  and  wind  to  fall  upon  the  oxen  or  the  sheep  or  wilding  deer. ' 

Or,  again: 

'Hermes  sped  along  the  waves  like  sea-mew  hunting  fish  in  awe- 
some hollows  of  the  sea  unharvested  and  wetting  his  thick  plumage 
in  the  brine.' 


38  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

One  of  the  longer  and  best-known  comparisons  is  the  description 
in  the  Iliad  of  the  Trojan  encampment  by  night: 

'Now  they  with  hearts  exultant  through  the  livelong  night  sat 
by  the  space  that  bridged  the  moat  of  war,  their  watch-fires  multi- 
tudinous alight.  And  just  as  in  the  sky  the  stars  around  the  radi- 
ant moon  shine  clear ;  when  windless  is  the  air ;  when  all  the  peaks 
stand  out,  the  lofty  forelands  and  the  glades;  when  breaketh  open 
from  the  sky  the  ether  infinite,  and  all  the  stars  are  seen  and  make 
the  shepherds  glad  at  heart — so  manifold  appeared  the  watch-fires 
kindled  by  the  Trojan  men  in  front  of  Ilios  betwixt  the  streams 
of  Xanthus  and  the  ships.  So  then  a  thousand  fires  burned  upon 
the  plain,  and  fifty  warriors  by  the  side  of  each  were  seated  in  the 
blazing  fire's  gleam,  the  while  the  horses  by  the  chariots  stood  and 
champed  white  barley  and  the  spelt  and  waited  for  the  throned 
Dawn. ' 

Sappho's  fragments  are  redolent  of  flowers;  her  woven  verse, 
a  'rich-red  chlamys'  in  the  sunshine,  has  a  silver  sheen  in  the  moon- 
light. "We  hear  the  full-throated  passion  of  'the  herald  of  the 
spring,  the  nightingale';  the  breeze  moves  the  apple  boughs,  the 
wind  shakes  the  oak  trees.  Her  allusions  to  'the  hyacinths,  dark- 
ening the  ground,  when  trampled  under  foot  of  shepherds';  the 
'fine,  soft  bloom  of  grass,  trodden  by  the  tender  feet  of  Cretan 
women  as  they  dance ' ;  or  the  '  golden  pulse  growing  on  the  shore ' — 
all  these  seem  inevitable  to  one  who  has  seen  the  acres  of  bright 
flowers  that  carpet  the  islands  or  the  near-by  littoral  of  the  Asian 
coast.  Her  comparison  of  a  bridegroom  to  'a  supple  sapling' 
recalls  how  Nausicaa,  vigorous,  tall,  and  straight  as  the  modern 
athletic  maiden,  is  likened  by  Odysseus  to  the  'young  shaft  of  a 
palm  tree'  that  he  had  once  seen  'springing  up  in  Delos  by  Apollo's 
altar.'  In  her  Lesbian  orchards  the  sweet  quince-apple  is  still  left 
hanging  'solitary  on  the  topmost  bough,  upon  its  very  end';  and 
there  is  heard  'cool  murmuring  through  apple  boughs  while  slum- 
ber floateth  down  from  quivering  leaves.'  Nor  need  we  attribute 
Sappho's  love  of  natural  beauty  wholly  to  her  passionate  woman's 
nature.  All  the  gentler  emotions  springing  from  an  habitual  obser- 
vation of  nature  recur  in  poets  of  the  sterner  sex.  'The  Graces,' 
she  says,  '  turn  their  faces  from  those  who  wear  no  garlands. '  And 
at  banquets  wreaths  were  an  essential  also  for  masculine  full 
dress.  Pindar,  in  describing  Elysian  happiness,  leads  up  to  the 
climax  of  the  companionship  with  the  great  and  noble  dead  by 
telling  how  'round  the  islands  of  the  blest  the  ocean  breezes  blow, 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY     39 

and  flowers  of  gold  are  blooming;  some  from  the  land  on  trees  of 
splendor,  and  some  the  water  feedeth;  with  wreaths  whereof  they 
twine  their  heads  and  hands.'3  Against  the  green  background 
passes  Evadne  with  her  silver  pitcher  and  her  girdle  of  rich  crimson 
woof,  and  her  child  is  seen  'hidden  in  the  rushes  of  the  thicket 
unexplored,  his  tender  flesh  all  steeped  in  golden  and  deep  purple 
light  from  pansy  flowers.' 

To  follow  through  the  poetry  of  the  Greeks  the  unfailing  delight 
in  the  radiance  of  the  moon  would  be  to  follow  her  diurnal  course 
as  she  passes  over  Greek  lands  from  east  to  west.  The  full  moon 
looked  down  on  all  the  Olympian  festivals,  and  Pindar's  pages  are 
illuminated  with  her  glittering  argentry.  The  Lesbian  nights 
inspire  Sappho  as  did  all  things  beautiful. 

'The  clustering  stars  about  the  radiant  moon  avert  their  faces 
bright  and  hide,  what  time  her  orb  is  rounded  to  the  full  and 
touches  earth  with  silver.' 

Wordsworth  could  take  this  thought  from  Sappho:  'The  moon 
doth  with  delight  look  round  her  when  the  heavens  are  bare ' ;  but 
the  Lesbian  certainly  did  not  finish  the  fragment  by  lamenting  that 
'there  hath  past  away  a  glory  from  the  earth.' 

The  night  and  the  day  alike  claimed  the  attention  of  the  poets, 
and  the  interchange  of  dusk  and  dawn  appealed  to  the  sculptor 
also.  In  the  east  gable  of  the  Parthenon  the  horses  of  the  Sun 
and  of  the  Moon  were  at  either  end.  Nature's  sleep  is  a  favorite 
topic.    Alcman  's  description  is  unusual  only  for  its  detail : 

Sleep  the  peaks  and  mountain  clefts ; 
Forelands  and  the  torrent's  rifts; 
All  the  creeping  things  are  sleeping, 
Cherished  in  the  black  earth's  keeping; 
Mountain-ranging  beast  and  bee ; 
Fish  in  depths  of  the  purple  sea ; 
Wide-winged  birds  their  pinions  droop — 
Sleep  now  all  the  feathered  troop. 

Goethe,  in  his  well-known  paraphrase — 

Ueber  alien  Gipfeln 
1st  Ruh, — 

»  Translation  by  E.  Myers  (modified). 


40  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

cannot  refrain  from  adding  the  subjective  conclusion  of  the  whole 
matter : 

Die  Vogelein  schweigen  in  Walde. 

Warte  nur,  balde 

Ruhest  du  auch. 

The  great  dramatists  display  an  observation  of  the  beauty  of  the 
external  world  not  always  sufficiently  emphasized.  In  Aeschylus 
an  intense  feeling  is  evident;  none  the  less  because  it  is  subordi- 
nated to  his  theme  or  used  to  point,  by  way  of  contrast,  some  awe- 
inspiring  or  pathetic  situation  or  some  scene  of  blood.  Clytem- 
nestra  describes  how  she  murdered  her  husband.  His  spattering 
blood,  she  says, 

Keeps  striking  me  with  dusky  drops  of  murd'rous  dew, 
Aye,  me  rejoicing  none  the  less  than  God's  sweet  rain 
Makes  glad  the  corn-land  at  the  birth-pangs  of  the  buds. 

Comparisons,  similes,  and  epithets  drawn  from  the  sea  reappear 
continually  in  the  warp  and  woof  of  Greek,  and  especially  of 
Athenian,  literature.  Aeschylus,  like  the  rest,  knew  the  sea  in 
all  its  moods,  terrible  in  storm,  deceitful  in  calm,  beautiful  at  all 
times,  and  the  pathway  for  commerce  and  for  war.  The  returning 
herald  in  the  Agamemnon  rehearses  the  soldiers'  hard  bivouac  in 
summer  and  in  winter: 

And  should  one  tell  of  winter,  dealing  death  to  birds, 
"What  storms  unbearable  swept  down  from  Ida's  snow, 
Or  summer 's  heat  when,  ruffled  by  no  rippling  breeze, 
Ocean  slept  waveless,  on  his  midday  couch  laid  prone. 

With  the  first  lines  of  Prometheus  Bound  we  are  carried  far  from 
the  haunts  of  men : 

Unto  this  far  horizon  of  earth's  plain  we've  come, 
This  Scythian  tract,  this  desert  by  man's  foot  untrod. 

Hephaestus,  reluctant,  compelled  by  Zeus'  order,  rivets  his  kin- 
god,  the  Fire-bringer,  to  the  desolate  North  Sea  crag,  and  with- 
draws, leaving  Prometheus  in  fetters  to  'wrestle  down  the  myriad 
years  of  time.'  The  night  shuts  off  the  warmth  and  light,  draw- 
ing over  him  her  'star-embroidered  robe,'  and  the  fierce  sun-god 
returns  with  blazing  rays  to  'deflower  his  fair  skin'  bared  of  the 
white  counterpane  of  'frost  of  early  dawn.'  Not  until  the  emis- 
saries of  Zeus  have  departed  does  Prometheus  deign  to  speak. 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY  41 

Then  he  'communes  with  nature.'  He  has  no  hope  of  help  from 
God,  none  from  the  'helpless  creatures  of  the  day'  whom  he  has 
helped.  Alone  with  the  forces  of  nature,  he  utters  that  outcry- 
unsurpassed  in  sublimity  and  in  pathos: 

O  upper  air  divine  and  winds  on  swift  wings  borne; 
Ye  river-springs;  innumerous  laughter  of  the  waves 
Of  Ocean ;  thou,  Earth,  the  mother  of  us  all ; 
And  thou,  all-seeing  orb  of  the  Sun — to  you  I  cry : 
Behold  me  what  I  'm  suffering,  a  god  from  gods ! 

Sophocles,  too,  lets  Philoctetes,  in  his  misery  and  loneliness  on  the 
rocky  Island  of  Lemnos,  call  out  to  the  wild  beasts  and  the  land- 
scape : 

Harbors  and  headlands,  and  ye  mountain-ranging  beasts, 
Companions  mine,  ye  gnawed  and  hanging  cliffs !    Of  this 
To  you  I  cry  aloud,  for  I  have  none  save  you — 
You  ever  present  here — to  whom  to  make  my  cry. 

In  his  famous  ode  on  the  Attic  Colonus  he  describes  the  natural 
beauty  of  his  home  with  particularizing  exactness.  He  has  also 
a  wealth  of  glittering  epithet  used  for  local  coloring,  for  symbolism 
and  personification.  The  contrast  of  day  and  night  offers  to  him 
a  welcome  mise  en  scene.  The  sun's  rays  are  Apollo's  golden 
shafts,  and  the  moon's  light  seems  to  filter  through  the  trees  as 
Artemis  roams  the  uplands: 

0  God  of  the  light,  from  the  woven  gold 
Of  the  strings  of  thy  bow,  I  am  fain  to  behold 
Thy  arrows  invincible,  showered  around, 
As  champions  smiting  our  foes  to  the  ground. 
And  Artemis,  too,  with  her  torches  flaring, 
Gleams  onward  through  Lycian  uplands  faring. 

Bacchus,  also,  the  'god  of  the  golden  snood,'  'lifts  his  pine-knot's 
sparkle,'  and,  roaming  with  his  Maenads,  seems  to  visualize  for 
men  the  soul  of  nature. 

Aristophanes  with  his  common-sense  objectivity  was  averse  to 
the  sentimental  and  romantic  in  Euripides,  which  seemed  to  him 
effeminate.  His  love  for  nature  was  clear-eyed  and  Hellenic.  His 
lyrics  shine  like  a  bird's  white  wing  in  the  sunlight.  The  self- 
invocation  of  the  Clouds  is  alive  with  the  radiance  of  the  Attic 
atmosphere.  A  translation  can  only  serve  to  illustrate  the  elements 
used  in  the  description : 


42  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

Chorus  of  Clouds 

Come  ever  floating,  O  Clouds,  anew, 
Let  us  rise  with  the  radiant  dew 

Of  our  nature  undefiled 
From  father  Ocean's  billows  wild. 

The  tree-fringed  peak 
Of  hill  upon  lofty  hill  let  us  seek, 
That  we  may  look  on  the  cliffs  far-seen, 
And  the  sacred  land 's  water  that  lends  its  green 
To  the  fruits,  and  the  whispering  rush  of  the  rivers  divine, 
And  the  clamorous  roar  of  the  dashing  brine ; 

For  Ether 's  eye  is  flashing  his  light, 

Untired  by  glare  as  of  marble  bright. 

The  '  meteor  eyes '  of  the  sun  gaze  '  sanguine '  and  unblinking  upon 
the  cloud-palisades,  glaring  bright  as  the  marble  of  Mount  Penteli- 
cus.  Readers  of  the  Greek  will  recognize  here  and  there  how  an 
Aristophanic  epithet  or  thought  has  been  precipitated  and  recom- 
bined  by  Shelley  into  new  and  radiant  shapes  that  drift  through 
his  own  cloud-land : 

I  change,  but  I  cannot  die. 

Aristophanes'  observation  of  nature  is  varied  and  exact.  He  had 
nothing  but  ridicule  for  the  pale  student  within  doors,  and  only 
a  man  who  kept  up  an  intimacy  with  'the  open  road'  could  have 
made  the  naturalistic  painting  in  the  Peace  of  the  serenity  of 
country  life: 

'We  miss  the  life  of  days  gone  by,  the  pressed  fruit-cakes,  the 
figs,  the  myrtles  and  the  sweet  new  wine,  the  olive  trees,  the  violet 
bed  beside  the  well.' 

Euripides  in  his  attitude  toward  nature  has  all  the  qualities  of 
the  other  tragedians  except  sublimity,  to  which  he  more  rarely 
attains.  Many  qualities  are  much  more  conspicuous.  His  range 
of  color  is  wider.  His  allusions  to  rivers  and  to  the  plant  and  ani- 
mal world  are  more  detailed.  Picturesque  scenes  and  setting  de- 
light him.  Beyond  all  this,  the  reflection  in  nature  of  human 
emotion,  occasional  in  his  predecessors,  plays  in  his  verse  almost 
a  leading  part.  Modern  romanticism,  in  short,  is  no  longer 
exceptional. 

Hippolytus,  the  acolyte  of  Artemis,  and  his  attendants  address 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY     43 

the  virgin  goddess  who  ranges  the  woods  and  mountains,  and  who, 
as  Aeschylus  says,  is  'kindly  unto  all  the  young  things  suckled  at 
the  breast  of  wild- wood  roaming  beasts. '  The  '  modern '  element  in 
the  original  loses  nothing  in  this  paraphrase  by  Mallock : 

Hail,  0  most  pure,  most  perfect,  loveliest  one ! 

Lo,  in  my  hand  I  bear, 
Woven  for  the  circling  of  thy  long  gold  hair, 
Culled  leaves  and  flowers,  from  places  which  the  sun, 

The  spring,  long  shines  upon, 
Where  never  shepherd  hath  driven  flock  to  graze, 

Nor  any  grass  is  mown; 
But  there  sound  throughout  the  sunny,  sweet  warm  days, 

'Mid  the  green  holy  place 

The  wild  bee's  wings  alone. 

In  one  of  the  despairing  chorals  of  the  Trojan  Women  the  personifi- 
cation of  nature  blends  with  the  spirit  of  mythology.  The  name  of 
Tithonus,  easily  supplied  by  a  Greek  hearer,  is  inserted  for  English 
readers  in  Gilbert  Murray 's  beautiful  paraphrase : 

For  Zeus — 0  leave  it  unspoken : 

But  alas  for  the  love  of  the  Morn ; 
Morn  of  the  milk-white  wing, 
The  gentle,  the  earth-loving, 
That  shineth  on  battlements  broken 

In  Troy,  and  a  people  forlorn! 
And,  lo,  in  her  bowers  Tithonus, 

Our  brother,  yet  sleeps  as  of  old: 
0,  she  too  hath  loved  us  and  known  us, 

And  the  Steeds  of  her  star,  flashing  gold, 
Stooped  hither  and  bore  him  above  us; 

Then  blessed  we  the  Gods  in  our  joy. 
But  all  that  made  them  to  love  us 

Hath  perished  from  Troy. 

When  Dionysus  addresses  his  Bacchantes,  Euripides,  in  lines  remi- 
niscent of  Alcman,  imposes  upon  outward  nature  the  solemn 
expectancy  of  the  inward  mind : 

Hushed  was  the  ether ;  in  hushed  silence  whispered  not 
Leaves  in  the  coppice  nor  the  blades  of  meadow  grass ; 
No  cry  at  all  of  any  wild  things  had  you  heard. 


44  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

The  formal  banns  of  the  open  wedlock  of  man  and  nature  were 
declared  in  Euripides.  Thereafter  the  treatment  became  more  and 
more  a  matter  of  personal  equation.  In  Plato's  Dialogues,  for 
example,  the  ethical  element  inevitably  appears.  In  the  famous 
scene  beside  the  Ilissus,  Socrates  and  young  Phaedrus  talk  through 
the  heated  hours  beneath  the  shade  of  the  wide-spreading  plane 
tree,  where  the  agnus  castus  is  in  full  bloom,  where  water  cool 
to  the  unsandaled  feet  flows  by,  and  in  the  branches  the  cicadae, 
'prophets  of  the  Muses,'  contribute  of  their  wisdom. 

The  Anthology,  stretched  through  the  centuries  of  Greek  litera- 
ture, links  the  old  and  the  newer,  the  antique  reserve  and  the  f ain- 
ness  of  modern  romanticism.  One  of  the  epigrams  attributed  to 
Plato  will  serve  to  indicate  the  emergence  of  the  latter : 

On  the  stars  thou  art  gazing,  my  Star ; 
"Would  that  the  sky  I  might  be, 
For  then  from  afar 
With  my  manifold  eyes  I  would  gaze  upon  thee. 

Another  seems  like  an  artist's  preliminary  sketch  for  the  picture 
by  the  Ilissus,  the  deeper  motive  not  yet  painted  in : 

Sit  thee  down  by  this  pine  tree  whose  twigs  without  number 

Whisper  aloft  in  the  west  wind  aquiver. 

Lo !  here  by  my  stream  as  it  chattereth  ever 

The  Pan-pipe  enchanteth  thine  eyelids  to  slumber. 

From  this  we  pass  without  break  to  the  piping  shepherds  and 
the  country  charms  with  which  Theocritus  filled  his  Idyls  for  city- 
jaded  men : 

There  we  lay, 
Half -buried  in  a  couch  of  fragrant  reed 
And  fresh-cut  vine-leaves,  who  so  glad  as  we  ? 
A  wealth  of  elm  and  poplar  shook  o  'erhead ; 
Hard  by,  a  sacred  spring  flowed  gurgling  on 
From  the  Nymphs '  grot,  and  in  the  sombre  boughs 
The  sweet  cicada  chirped  laboriously. 
Hid  in  the  thick  thorn-bushes  far  away, 
The  treefrog's  note  was  heard;  the  crested  lark 
Sang  with  the  goldfinch ;  turtles  made  their  moan, 
And  o  'er  the  fountain  hung  the  gilded  bee.4 

*  Translated  by  C.  S.  Calverley. 


EXTERNAL  NATURE  IN  GREEK  POETRY     45 

Notwithstanding  the  variety  in  landscape  and  the  lack  of  unified 
nationality  in  the  long  centuries  of  Greek  history,  there  is  a  unity 
in  the  impression  of  ancient  life  left  upon  the  mind  by  a  visit  to 
Greece.  This  is  in  part  due  to  the  comparative  meagreness  of 
remains  from  periods  subsequent  to  classic  times.  The  long  obliter- 
ation of  mediaeval  and  modern  constructive  civilization  leaves  more 
clear  the  outlines  of  antiquity. 

This  is  true  even  though  the  sum  total  of  the  remains  of  Byzan- 
tine and  mediaeval  life,  on  islands  and  on  mainland,  is  large,  and 
claims  the  attention  from  time  to  time.  In  Athens  the  traveler  will 
come  upon  the  small  Metropolis  church  with  its  ancient  Greek 
calendar  of  festivals,  let  in  as  a  frieze  above  the  entrance,  and 
metamorphosed  into  Byzantine  sanctity  by  the  inscribing  of 
Christian  crosses.  As  he  journeys  to  and  fro  in  Greece  he  may  see 
the  venerable  'hundred-gated'  church  on  the  Island  of  Paros, 
recalling  in  certain  details  the  proscenium  of  an  ancient  theatre; 
Monemvasia  with  its  vast  ruins,  the  home  of  Byzantine  ecclesiasti- 
cism  and  a  splendor  of  court  life  that  vied  with  the  pomp  and 
magnificence  of  "Western  Europe ;  or  the  ivy-clad  ruins  of  Mistra, 
an  epitome  of  Graeco-Byzantine  art  from  the  thirteenth  to  the 
fifteenth  century;  the  frowning  hill  and  castle  of  Karytaena  that 
guards  the  approach  to  the  mountain  fastnesses  of  Arcadia;  or  the 
ancient  acropolis  of  Lindus  on  the  Island  of  Rhodes  with  the 
impregnable  fortress  of  the  Knights  of  St.  John. 

Nor  will  the  visitor  ignore  the  reminders  of  the  "War  of  Inde- 
pendence and  the  renascence  of  life  in  modern  Greece.  Mesolonghi, 
Nauplia,  and  Arachova  have  contributed  fresh  chapters  to  human 
history.  Aligned  with  ancient  names  are  those  of  modern  heroes 
in  the  nomenclature  of  the  streets  and  of  public  squares,  like  the 
Karaiskakis  Place  that  welcomes  the  traveler  as  he  disembarks  at 
Piraeus. 

But  all  of  these,  whether  mediaeval  or  modern,  fail  to  blur  the 
understanding  of  antiquity.  They  do  not  obtrude  themselves.  Often 
they  even  illustrate  ancient  life.  The  same  wisdom  that  transferred 
allegiance  from  the  Saturnalia  to  the  Christmas  festival  has  here 
also  been  careful  to  use  for  Byzantine  churches  the  site  of  ancient 
shrines  or  temples :  St.  Elias  is  a  familiar  name  on  high  mountains 
where  once  stood  altars  of  the  Olympians ;  the  cult  of  Dionysus  has 
been  skilfully  transformed,  in  vine-rearing  Naxos,  into  that  of  St. 
Dionysius;  SS.  Cosmo  and  Damiano,  patrons  of  medicine,  and 
known  as  the  'feeless'  saints,  have  established  their  free  dispensary 
in  place  of  an  Asclepieion;  the  twelve  Apostles  have  replaced  the 


46  F.  G.  ALLINSON  AND  A.  C.  E.  ALLINSON 

'Twelve  Gods';  and  churches  dedicated  to  St.  Demetrius  have  been 
substituted  for  shrines  of  Demeter. 

The  thoughtful  student  of  the  literature  of  the  Greeks,  no  matter 
how  enthusiastic  he  may  be,  will  not  fail  to  draw  warnings  as  well 
as  inspiration  from  their  history.  But  no  defects  of  the  Greeks 
nor  achievements  of  posterity  can  dispossess  Hellas  of  her  peculiar 
lustre.  'No  other  nation,'  as  Mr.  Ernest  Myers  has  said  with 
particular  reference  to  the  age  of  Pindar,  'has  ever  before  or  since 
known  what  it  was  to  stand  alone  immeasurably  advanced  at  the 
head  of  the  civilization  of  the  world. ' 


IV 

FROM  PARADISE  REGAINED  » 

By  John  Milton 

Behold 
"Where  on  the  Aegean  shore  a  city  stands, 
Built  nobly — pure  the  air,  and  light  the  soil : 
Athens,  the  eye  of  Greece,  mother  of  arts 
And  eloquence,  native  to  famous  wits, 
Or  hospitable,  in  her  sweet  recess, 
City  or  suburban,  studious  walks  and  shades. 
See  there  the  olive  grove  of  Academe, 
Plato's  retirement,  where  the  Attic  bird 
Trills  her  thick- warbled  notes  the  summer  long ; 
There  flowery  hill  Hymettus  with  the  sound 
Of  bees'  industrious  murmur  oft  invites 
To  studious  musing;  there  Ilissus  rolls 
His  whispering  stream.    Within  the  walls  then  view 
The  schools  of  ancient  sages — his  who  bred 
Great  Alexander  to  subdue  the  world; 
Lyceum  there,  and  painted  Stoa  next. 
There  thou  shalt  hear  and  learn  the  secret  power 
Of  harmony  in  tones  and  numbers  hit 
By  voice  or  hand,  and  various-measured  verse, 
Aeolian  charms  and  Dorian  lyric  odes, 
And  his  who  gave  them  breath,  but  higher  sung, 
Blind  Melesigenes,  thence  Homer  called, 
Whose  poem  Phoebus  challenged  for  his  own. 
Thence  what  the  lofty  grave  tragedians  taught 
In  chorus  or  iambic,  teachers  best 
Of  moral  prudence,  with  delight  received, 
In  brief  sententious  precepts,  while  they  treat 

[i  Paradise  'Regained  4.  237-280.  It  should  perhaps  be  remarked  that  the 
sentiments  are  not  precisely  those  of  Milton,  but  such  as  he  deems  suitable  to 
a  persuasive  speech  from  Satan.  In  any  case  it  is  a  notable  piece  of  condensed 
eloquence. — Editor.] 


48  JOHN  MILTON 

Of  fate,  and  chance,  and  change  in  human  life, 
High  actions  and  high  passions  best  describing. 
Thence  to  the  famous  orators  repair, 
Those  ancient,  whose  resistless  eloquence 
Wielded  at  will  that  fierce  democratie, 
Shook  the  arsenal,  and  fulmined  over  Greece 
To  Macedon  and  Artaxerxes'  throne. 
To  sage  philosophy  next  lend  thine  ear, 
From  heaven  descended  to  the  low-roofed  house 
Of  Socrates;  see  there  his  tenement, 
Whom  well-inspired  the  oracle  pronounced 
Wisest  of  men ;  from  whose  mouth  issued  forth 
Mellifluous  streams  that  watered  all  the  schools 
Of  Academics  old  and  new,  with  those 
Surnamed  Peripatetics,  and  the  sect 
Epicurean,  and  the  Stoic  severe. 


V 
ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  x 
By  John  Henry  Newman 

If  we  would  know  what  a  university  is,  considered  in  its  ele- 
mentary idea,  we  must  betake  ourselves  to  the  first  and  most  cele- 
brated home  of  European  literature  and  source  of  European  civili- 
zation, to  the  bright  and  beautiful  Athens — Athens,  whose  schools 
drew  to  her  bosom,  and  then  sent  back  again  to  the  business  of  life, 
the  youth  of  the  Western  "World  for  a  long  thousand  years.  Seated 
on  the  verge  of  the  Continent,  the  city  seemed  hardly  suited  for 
the  duties  of  a  central  metropolis  of  knowledge;  yet,  what  it  lost 
in  convenience  of  approach,  it  gained  in  its  neighborhood  to  the 
traditions  of  the  mysterious  East,  and  in  the  loveliness  of  the 
region  in  which  it  lay.  Hither,  then,  as  to  a  sort  of  ideal  land, 
where  all  archetypes  of  the  great  and  the  fair  were  found  in 
substantial  being,  and  all  departments  of  truth  explored,  and  all 
diversities  of  intellectual  power  exhibited,  where  taste  and  phi- 
losophy were  majestically  enthroned  as  in  a  royal  court,  where 
there  was  no  sovereignty  but  that  of  mind,  and  no  nobility  but  that 
of  genius,  where  professors  were  rulers,  and  princes  did  homage — 
hither  flocked  continually  from  the  very  corners  of  the  orbis  ter- 
rarum  the  many-tongued  generation,  just  rising,  or  just  risen  into 
manhood,  in  order  to  gain  wisdom. 

Pisistratus  had  in  an  early  age  discovered  and  nursed  the  infant 
genius  of  his  people,  and  Cimon,  after  the  Persian  war,  had  given 
it  a  home.  That  war  had  established  the  naval  supremacy  of 
Athens ;  she  had  become  an  imperial  state ;  and  the  Ionians,  bound 
to  her  by  the  double  chain  of  kindred  and  of  subjection,  were 

[iFrom  Newman's  Historical  Sketches  (pp.  18-23,  33-46),  London,  1872. 
'We  need  not,'  says  Newman,  referring  to  his  account  of  Athens,  'be  very 
solicitous  about  anachronisms.'  In  point  of  fact,  disregarding  chronology,  he 
has  produced  a  composite  picture  of  the  city,  putting  in  touches  from  different 
periods  of  its  history,  the  general  effect  being  to  emphasize  what  is  character- 
istic of  later  times  somewhat  more  than  the  typical  Hellenic  civilization. — 
Editor.] 


50  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

importing  into  her  both  their  merchandise  and  their  civilization. 
The  arts  and  philosophy  of  the  Asiatic  coast  were  easily  carried 
across  the  sea,  and  there  was  Cimon,  as  I  have  said,  with  his  ample 
fortune,  ready  to  receive  them  with  due  honors.  Not  content  with 
patronizing  their  professors,  he  built  the  first  of  those  noble  porti- 
coes, of  which  we  hear  so  much  in  Athens,  and  he  formed  the  groves, 
which  in  process  of  time  became  the  celebrated  Academy.  Planting 
is  one  of  the  most  graceful,  as  in  Athens  it  was  one  of  the  most 
beneficent  of  employments.  Cimon  took  in  hand  the  wild  wood, 
pruned  and  dressed  it,  and  laid  it  out  with  handsome  walks  and 
welcome  fountains.  Nor,  while  hospitable  to  the  authors  of  the 
city's  civilization,  was  he  ungrateful  to  the  instruments  of  her 
prosperity.  His  trees  extended  their  cool,  umbrageous  branches 
over  the  merchants,  who  assembled  in  the  Agora,  for  many  genera- 
tions. 

Those  merchants  certainly  had  deserved  that  act  of  bounty;  for 
all  the  while  their  ships  had  been  carrying  forth  the  intellectual 
fame  of  Athens  to  the  "Western  World.  Then  commenced  what  may 
be  called  her  university  existence.  Pericles,  who  succeeded  Cimon 
both  in  the  government  and  in  the  patronage  of  art,  is  said  by 
Plutarch  to  have  entertained  the  idea  of  making  Athens  the  capital 
of  federated  Greece;  in  this  he  failed,  but  his  encouragement  of 
such  men  as  Phidias  and  Anaxagoras  led  the  way  to  her  acquiring 
a  far  more  lasting  sovereignty  over  a  far  wider  empire.  Little 
understanding  the  sources  of  her  own  greatness,  Athens  would  go 
to  war.  Peace  is  the  interest  of  a  seat  of  commerce  and  the  arts, 
but  to  war  she  went ;  yet  to  her,  whether  peace  or  war,  it  mattered 
not.  The  political  power  of  Athens  waned  and  disappeared ;  king- 
doms rose  and  fell;  centuries  rolled  away — they  did  but  bring 
fresh  triumphs  to  the  city  of  the  poet  and  the  sage.  There  at  length 
the  swarthy  Moor  and  Spaniard  were  seen  to  meet  the  blue-eyed 
Gaul;  and  the  Cappadocian,  late  subject  of  Mithridates,  gazed 
without  alarm  at  the  haughty  conquering  Roman.  Revolution 
after  revolution  passed  over  the  face  of  Europe,  as  well  as  of 
Greece,  but  still  she  was  there — Athens,  the  city  of  mind — as 
radiant,  as  splendid,  as  delicate,  as  young,  as  ever  she  had  been. 

Many  a  more  fruitful  coast  or  isle  is  washed  by  the  blue  Aegean, 
many  a  spot  is  there  more  beautiful  or  sublime  to  see,  many  a 
territory  more  ample;  but  there  was  one  charm  in  Attica,  which 
in  the  same  perfection  was  nowhere  else.  The  deep  pastures  of 
Arcadia,  the  plain  of  Argos,  the  Thessalian  vale,  these  had  not  the 
gift.     Boeotia,  which  lay  to  its  immediate  north,  was  notorious 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  51 

for  its  very  want  of  it.  The  heavy  atmosphere  of  that  Boeotia 
might  be  good  for  vegetation,  but  it  was  associated  in  popular 
belief  with  the  dulness  of  the  Boeotian  intellect.  On  the  contrary, 
the  special  purity,  elasticity,  clearness,  and  salubrity  of  the  air  of 
Attica,  fit  concomitant  and  emblem  of  its  genius,  did  that  for  it 
which  earth  did  not — it  brought  out  every  bright  hue  and  tender 
shade  of  the  landscape  over  which  it  was  spread,  and  would  have 
illuminated  the  face  even  of  a  more  bare  and  rugged  country. 

A  confined  triangle,  perhaps  fifty  miles  its  greatest  length,  and 
thirty  its  greatest  breadth ;  two  elevated  rocky  barriers,  meeting  at 
an  angle;  three  prominent  mountains,  commanding  the  plain — 
Parnes,  Pentelicus,  and  Hymettus;  an  unsatisfactory  soil;  some 
streams,  not  always  full — such  is  about  the  report  which  the  agent 
of  a  London  company  would  have  made  of  Attica.  He  would 
report  that  the  climate  was  mild;  the  hills  were  limestone;  there 
was  plenty  of  good  marble ;  more  pasture  land  than  at  first  survey 
might  have  been  expected,  sufficient  certainly  for  sheep  and  goats ; 
fisheries  productive;  silver  mines  once,  but  long  since  worked  out; 
figs  fair ;  oil  first-rate ;  olives  in  profusion.  But  what  he  would  not 
think  of  noting  down  was  that  that  olive  tree  was  so  choice  in 
nature,  and  so  noble  in  shape,  that  it  excited  a  religious  venera- 
tion; and  that  it  took  so  kindly  to  the  light  soil  as  to  expand  into 
woods  upon  the  open  plain,  and  to  climb  up  and  fringe  the  hills. 
He  would  not  think  of  writing  word  to  his  employers  how  that 
clear  air,  of  which  I  have  spoken,  brought  out,  yet  blended  and 
subdued,  the  colors  on  the  marble  till  they  had  a  softness  and 
harmony,  for  all  their  richness,  which  in  a  picture  looks  exag- 
gerated, yet  is  after  all  within  the  truth.  He  would  not  tell  how 
that  same  delicate  and  brilliant  atmosphere  freshened  up  the  pale 
olive  till  the  olive  forgot  its  monotony,  and  its  cheek  glowed  like 
the  arbutus  or  beech  of  the  Umbrian  hills.  He  would  say  nothing 
of  the  thyme  and  thousand  fragrant  herbs  which  carpeted  Hymet- 
tus ;  he  would  hear  nothing  of  the  hum  of  its  bees ;  nor  take  much 
account  of  the  rare  flavor  of  its  honey,  since  Gozo  and  Minorca 
were  sufficient  for  the  English  demand.  He  would  look  over  the 
Aegean  from  the  height  he  had  ascended ;  he  would  follow  with  his 
eye  the  chain  of  islands,  which,  starting  from  the  Sunian  headland, 
seemed  to  offer  the  fabled  divinities  of  Attica,  when  they  would 
visit  their  Ionian  cousins,  a  sort  of  viaduct  thereto  across  the  sea. 
But  that  fancy  would  not  occur  to  him,  nor  any  admiration  of  the 
dark  violet  billows  with  their  white  edges,  down  below;  nor  of 
those  graceful  fan-like  jets  of  silver  upon  the  rocks,  which  slowly 


52  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

rise  aloft  like  water  spirits  from  the  deep,  then  shiver,  and  break, 
and  spread,  and  shroud  themselves,  and  disappear,  in  a  soft  mist 
of  foam;  nor  of  the  gentle,  incessant  heaving  and  panting  of  the 
whole  liquid  plain;  nor  of  the  long  waves,  keeping  steady  time, 
like  a  line  of  soldiery,  as  they  resound  upon  the  hollow  shore — he 
would  not  deign  to  notice  that  restless  living  element  at  all,  except 
to  bless  his  stars  that  he  was  not  upon  it.  Nor  the  distinct  detail, 
nor  the  refined  coloring,  nor  the  graceful  outline  and  roseate  golden 
hue  of  the  jutting  crags,  nor  the  bold  shadows  cast  from  Otus  or 
Laurium  by  the  declining  sun — our  agent  of  a  mercantile  firm 
would  not  value  these  matters  even  at  a  low  figure.  Rather  we 
must  turn  for  the  sympathy  we  seek  to  yon  pilgrim  student,  come 
from  a  semi-barbarous  land  to  that  small  corner  of  the  earth,  as  to 
a  shrine  where  he  might  take  his  fill  of  gazing  on  those  emblems 
and  coruscations  of  invisible  unoriginate  perfection.  It  was  the 
stranger  from  a  remote  province,  from  Britain  or  from  Mauretania, 
who  in  a  scene  so  different  from  that  of  his  chilly,  woody  swamps, 
or  of  his  fiery,  choking  sands,  learned  at  once  what  a  real  univer- 
sity must  be,  by  coming  to  understand  the  sort  of  country  which 
was  its  suitable  home. 

Nor  was  this  all  that  a  university  required,  and  found  in  Athens. 
No  one,  even  there,  could  live  on  poetry.  If  the  students  at  that 
famous  place  had  nothing  better  than  bright  hues  and  soothing 
sounds,  they  would  not  have  been  able  or  disposed  to  turn  their 
residence  there  to  much  account.  Of  course  they  must  have  the 
means  of  living,  nay,  in  a  certain  sense,  of  enjoyment,  if  Athens 
was  to  be  an  Alma  Mater  at  the  time,  or  to  remain  afterwards  a 
pleasant  thought  in  their  memory.  And  so  they  had.  Be  it  recol- 
lected Athens  was  a  port,  and  a  mart  of  trade,  perhaps  the  first 
in  Greece;  and  this  was  very  much  to  the  point  when  a  number 
of  strangers  were  ever  flocking  to  it  whose  combat  was  to  be  with 
intellectual,  not  physical,  difficulties,  and  who  claimed  to  have 
their  bodily  wants  supplied  that  they  might  be  at  leisure  to  set 
about  furnishing  their  minds.  Now,  barren  as  was  the  soil  of 
Attica,  and  bare  the  face  of  the  country,  yet  it  had  only  too  many 
resources  for  an  elegant,  nay,  luxurious,  abode  there.  So  abun- 
dant were  the  imports  of  the  place  that  it  was  a  common  saying  that 
the  productions  which  were  found  singly  elsewhere  were  brought 
all  together  in  Athens.  Corn  and  wine,  the  staple  of  subsistence  in 
such  a  climate,  came  from  the  isles  of  the  Aegean;  fine  wool  and 
carpeting  from  Asia  Minor;  slaves,  as  now,  from  the  Euxine,  and 
timber,  too;  and  iron  and  brass  from  the  coasts  of  the  Mediter- 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  53 

ranean.  The  Athenian  did  not  condescend  to  manufactures  him- 
self, but  encouraged  them  in  others ;  and  a  population  of  foreigners 
caught  at  the  lucrative  occupation  both  for  home  consumption  and 
for  exportation.  Their  cloth,  and  other  textures  for  dress  and  fur- 
niture, and  their  hardware — for  instance,  armor — were  in  great 
request.  Labor  was  cheap;  stone  and  marble  in  plenty;  and  the 
taste  and  skill  which  at  first  were  devoted  to  public  buildings,  as 
temples  and  porticoes,  were  in  course  of  time  applied  to  the  man- 
sions of  public  men.  If  nature  did  much  for  Athens,  it  is  undeni- 
able that  art  did  much  more.  .  .  . 

It  has  been  my  desire,  were  I  able,  to  bring  before  the  reader 
what  Athens  may  have  been,  viewed  as  what  we  have  since  called 
a  university;  and  to  do  this,  not  with  any  purpose  of  writing  a 
panegyric  on  a  heathen  city,  or  of  denying  its  many  deformities, 
or  of  concealing  what  was  morally  base  in  what  was  intellectually 
great,  but  just  the  contrary,  of  representing  things  as  they  really 
were;  so  far,  that  is,  as  to  enable  him  to  see  what  a  university  is, 
in  the  very  constitution  of  society  and  in  its  own  idea,  what  is  its 
nature  and  object,  and  what  it  needs  of  aid  and  support  external 
to  itself  to  complete  that  nature  and  to  secure  that  object. 

So  now  let  us  fancy  our  Scythian,  or  Armenian,  or  African,  or 
Italian,  or  Gallic  student,  after  tossing  on  the  Saronic  waves,  which 
would  be  his  more  ordinary  course  to  Athens,  at  last  casting  anchor 
at  Piraeus.  He  is  of  any  condition  or  rank  of  life  you  please,  and 
may  be  made  to  order,  from  a  prince  to  a  peasant.  Perhaps  he  is 
some  Cleanthes,  who  has  been  a  boxer  in  the  public  games.  How 
did  it  ever  cross  his  brain  to  betake  himself  to  Athens  in  search  of 
wisdom  ?  Or,  if  he  came  thither  by  accident,  how  did  the  love  of  it 
ever  touch  his  heart  ?  But  so  it  was,  to  Athens  he  came  with  three 
drachms  in  his  girdle,  and  he  got  his  livelihood  by  drawing  water, 
carrying  loads,  and  the  like  servile  occupations.  He  attached  him- 
self, of  all  philosophers,  to  Zeno  the  Stoic — to  Zeno,  the  most  high- 
minded,  the  most  haughty  of  speculators;  and  out  of  his  daily 
earnings  the  poor  scholar  brought  his  master  the  daily  sum  of  an 
obolus,  in  payment  for  attending  his  lectures.  Such  progress  did 
he  make,  that  on  Zeno's  death  he  actually  was  his  successor  in  his 
school ;  and,  if  my  memory  does  not  play  me  false,  he  is  the  author 
of  a  hymn  to  the  Supreme  Being  which  is  one  of  the  noblest  effu- 
sions of  the  kind  in  classical  poetry.  Yet,  even  when  he  was  the 
head  of  a  school,  he  continued  in  his  illiberal  toil  as  if  he  had  been  a 
monk ;  and  it  is  said  that  once  when  the  wind  took  his  pallium,  and 
blew  it  aside,  he  was  discovered  to  have  no  other  garment  at  all — 


54  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

something  like  the  German  student  who  came  up  to  Heidelberg 
with  nothing  upon  him  but  a  greatcoat  and  a  pair  of  pistols. 

Or  it  is  another  disciple  of  the  Porch — Stoic  by  nature,  earlier 
than  by  profession — who  is  entering  the  city;  but  in  what  differ- 
ent fashion  he  comes!  It  is  no  other  than  Marcus,  Emperor  of 
Rome  and  philosopher.  Professors  long  since  were  summoned  from 
Athens  for  his  service  when  he  was  a  youth,  and  now  he  comes 
after  his  victories  on  the  battle-field,  to  make  his  acknowledgments 
at  the  end  of  life  to  the  city  of  wisdom,  and  to  submit  himself  to 
an  initiation  into  the  Eleusinian  mysteries. 

Or  it  is  a  young  man  of  great  promise  as  an  orator,  were  it  not 
for  his  weakness  of  chest,  which  renders  it  necessary  that  he  should 
acquire  the  art  of  speaking  without  over-exertion,  and  should  adopt 
a  delivery  sufficient  for  the  display  of  his  rhetorical  talents  on  the 
one  hand,  yet  merciful  to  his  physical  resources  on  the  other.  He 
is  called  Cicero;  he  will  stop  but  a  short  time,  and  will  pass  over 
to  Asia  Minor  and  its  cities,  before  he  returns  to  continue  a  career 
which  will  render  his  name  immortal;  and  he  will  like  his  short 
sojourn  at  Athens  so  well  that  he  will  take  good  care  to  send  his 
son  thither  at  an  earlier  age  than  he  visited  it  himself. 

But  see  where  comes  from  Alexandria  (for  we  need  not  be  very 
solicitous  about  anachronisms)  a  young  man  from  twenty  to 
twenty-two,  who  has  narrowly  escaped  drowning  on  his  voyage, 
and  is  to  remain  at  Athens  as  many  as  eight  or  ten  years,  yet  in 
the  course  of  that  time  will  not  learn  a  line  of  Latin,  thinking  it 
enough  to  become  accomplished  in  Greek  composition,  and  in  that 
he  will  succeed.  He  is  a  grave  person,  and  difficult  to  make  out; 
some  say  he  is  a  Christian — something  or  other  in  the  Christian 
line  his  father  is,  for  certain.  His  name  is  Gregory,  he  is  by  country 
a  Cappadocian,  and  will  in  time  become  pre-eminently  a  theologian, 
and  one  of  the  principal  Doctors  of  the  Greek  Church. 

Or  it  is  one  Horace,  a  youth  of  low  stature  and  black  hair,  whose 
father  has  given  him  an  education  at  Rome  above  his  rank  in  life, 
and  now  is  sending  him  to  finish  it  at  Athens.  He  is  said  to  have  a 
turn  for  poetry.  A  hero  he  is  not,  and  it  were  well  if  he  knew  it ; 
but  he  is  caught  by  the  enthusiasm  of  the  hour,  and  goes  off  cam- 
paigning with  Brutus  and  Cassius — and  will  leave  his  shield  behind 
him  on  the  field  of  Philippi. 

Or  it  is  a  mere  boy  of  fifteen;  his  name  Eunapius.  Though 
the  voyage  was  not  long,  seasickness,  or  confinement,  or  bad  living 
on  board  the  vessel,  threw  him  into  a  fever,  and  when  the  passen- 
gers landed  in  the  evening  at  Piraeus  he  could  not  stand.     His 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  55 

countrymen  who  accompanied  him  took  him  up  among  them,  and 
carried  him  to  the  house  of  a  great  teacher  of  the  day,  Proaeresius, 
who  was  a  friend  of  the  captain's,  and  whose  fame  it  was  which 
drew  the  enthusiastic  youth  to  Athens.  His  companions  under- 
stand the  sort  of  place  they  are  in,  and,  with  the  license  of  academic 
students,  they  break  into  the  philosopher's  house,  though  he  appears 
to  have  retired  for  the  night,  and  proceed  to  make  themselves  free 
of  it,  with  an  absence  of  ceremony  which  is  only  not  impudence 
because  Proaeresius  takes  it  so  easily.  Strange  introduction  for 
our  stranger  to  a  seat  of  learning,  but  not  out  of  keeping  with 
Athens;  for  what  could  you  expect  of  a  place  where  there  was  a 
mob  of  youths,  and  not  even  the  pretence  of  control;  where  the 
poorer  lived  anyhow,  and  got  on  as  they  could,  and  the  teachers 
themselves  had  no  protection  from  the  humors  and  caprices  of  the 
students  who  filled  their  lecture-halls?  However,  as  to  this  Euna- 
pius,  Proaeresius  took  a  fancy  to  the  boy,  and  told  him  curious 
stories  about  Athenian  life.  He  himself  had  come  up  to  the  uni- 
versity with  one  Hephaestion,  and  they  were  even  worse  off  than 
Cleanthes  the  Stoic;  for  they  had  only  one  cloak  between  them, 
and  nothing  whatever  besides,  except  some  old  bedding;  so  when 
Proaeresius  went  abroad,  Hephaestion  lay  in  bed,  and  practised 
himself  in  oratory;  and  then  Hephaestion  put  on  the  cloak,  and 
Proaeresius  crept  under  the  coverlet.  At  another  time  there  was 
so  fierce  a  feud  between  what  would  be  called  'town  and  gown' 
in  an  English  university  that  the  professors  did  not  dare  lecture 
in  public  for  fear  of  ill  treatment. 

But  a  Freshman  like  Eunapius  soon  got  experience  for  himself 
of  the  ways  and  manners  prevalent  in  Athens.  Such  a  one  as  he 
had  hardly  entered  the  city  when  he  was  caught  hold  of  by  a  party 
of  the  academic  youth,  who  proceeded  to  practise  on  his  awkward- 
ness and  his  ignorance.  At  first  sight  one  wonders  at  their  child- 
ishness ;  but  the  like  conduct  obtained  in  the  mediaeval  universities ; 
and  not  many  months  have  passed  away  since  the  journals  have 
told  us  of  sober  Englishmen,  given  to  matter-of-fact  calculations, 
and  to  the  anxieties  of  money-making,  pelting  each  other  with  snow- 
balls on  their  own  sacred  territory,  and  defying  the  magistracy 
when  they  would  interfere  with  their  privilege  of  becoming  boys. 
So  I  suppose  we  must  attribute  it  to  something  or  other  in  human 
nature.  Meanwhile,  there  stands  the  new-comer,  surrounded  by  a 
circle  of  his  new  associates,  who  forthwith  proceed  to  frighten, 
and  to  banter,  and  to  make  a  fool  of  him,  to  the  extent  of  their 
wit.     Some  address  him  with  mock  politeness,  others  with  fierce- 


56  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

ness;  and  so  they  conduct  him  in  solemn  procession  across  the 
Agora  to  the  baths;  and  as  they  approach  they  dance  about  him 
like  madmen.  But  this  was  to  be  the  end  of  his  trial,  for  the  bath 
was  a  sort  of  initiation;  he  thereupon  received  the  pallium,  or 
university  gown,  and  was  suffered  by  his  tormentors  to  depart  in 
peace.  One  alone  is  recorded  as  having  been  exempted  from  this 
persecution ;  it  was  a  youth  graver  and  loftier  than  even  St.  Greg- 
ory himself.  But  it  was  not  from  his  force  of  character,  but  at  the 
instance  of  Gregory,  that  he  escaped.  Gregory  was  his  bosom 
friend,  and  was  ready  in  Athens  to  shelter  him  when  he  came. 
It  was  another  saint  and  another  Doctor — the  great  Basil,  then 
(it  would  appear),  as  Gregory,  but  a  catechumen  of  the  Church. 

But  to  return  to  our  Freshman.  His  troubles  are  not  at  an 
end,  though  he  has  got  his  gown  upon  him.  Where  is  he  to  lodge  ? 
Whom  is  he  to  attend?  He  finds  himself  seized,  before  he  well 
knows  where  he  is,  by  another  party  of  men,  or  three  or  four  parties 
at  once,  like  foreign  porters  at  a  landing  who  seize  on  the  baggage 
of  the  perplexed  stranger,  and  thrust  half  a  dozen  cards  into  his 
unwilling  hands.  Our  youth  is  plied  by  the  hangers-on  of  Pro- 
fessor This,  or  Sophist  That,  each  of  whom  wishes  the  fame  or  the 
profit  of  having  a  houseful.  We  will  say  that  he  escapes  from  their 
hands — but  then  he  will  have  to  choose  for  himself  where  he  will 
put  up;  and,  to  tell  the  truth,  with  all  the  praise  I  have  already 
given  and  the  praise  I  shall  have  to  give  to  the  city  of  mind,  never- 
theless, between  ourselves,  the  brick  and  wood  which  formed  it, 
the  actual  tenements  where  flesh  and  blood  had  to  lodge  (always 
excepting  the  mansions  of  the  great  men  of  the  place),  do  not  seem 
to  have  been  much  better  than  those  of  Greek  or  Turkish  towns, 
which  are  at  this  moment  a  topic  of  interest  and  ridicule  in  the 
public  prints.  A  lively  picture  has  lately  been  set  before  us  of 
Gallipoli.  Take,  says  the  writer,2  a  multitude  of  the  dilapidated 
outhouses  found  in  farmyards  in  England,  of  the  rickety  old 
wooden  tenements,  the  cracked,  shutterless  structures  of  planks 
and  tiles,  the  sheds  and  stalls,  which  our  by-lanes,  or  fish-markets, 
or  river-sides  can  supply;  tumble  them  down  on  the  declivity  of  a 
bare  bald  hill;  let  the  spaces  between  house  and  house,  thus  acci- 
dentally determined,  be  understood  to  form  streets,  winding,  of 
course,  for  no  reason,  and  with  no  meaning,  up  and  down  the  town ; 
the  roadway  always  narrow,  the  breadth  never  uniform,  the  sepa- 
rate houses  bulging  or  retiring  below  as  circumstances  may  have 
determined,  and  leaning  forward  till  they  meet  overhead; — and 

2  Mr.  Kussell's  letters  in  the  Times  newspaper  (1854)   [April  26,  p.  9]. 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  57 

you  have  a  good  idea  of  Gallipoli.  I  question  whether  this  picture 
would  not  nearly  correspond  to  the  special  seat  of  the  Muses  in 
ancient  times.  Learned  writers  assure  us  distinctly  that  the  houses 
of  Athens  were  for  the  most  part  small  and  mean;  that  the  streets 
were  crooked  and  narrow;  that  the  upper  stories  projected  over 
the  roadway;  and  that  staircases,  balustrades,  and  doors  that 
opened  outwards,  obstructed  it — a  remarkable  coincidence  of  de- 
scription. I  do  not  doubt  at  all,  though  history  is  silent,  that  that 
roadway  was  jolting  to  carriages,  and  all  but  impassable ;  and  that 
it  was  traversed  by  drains,  as  freely  as  any  Turkish  town  now. 
Athens  seems  in  these  respects  to  have  been  below  the  average  cities 
of  its  time.  'A  stranger,'  says  an  ancient,  'might  doubt,  on  the 
sudden  view,  if  really  he  saw  Athens. ' 

I  grant  all  this,  and  much  more,  if  you  will ;  but,  recollect,  Athens 
was  the  home  of  the  intellectual  and  beautiful ;  not  of  low  mechani- 
cal contrivances  and  material  organization.  Why  stop  within  your 
lodgings,  counting  the  rents  in  your  wall  or  the  holes  in  your  tiling, 
when  nature  and  art  call  you  away?  You  must  put  up  with  such 
a  chamber,  and  a  table,  and  a  stool,  and  a  sleeping-board,  any- 
where else  in  the  three  continents;  one  place  does  not  differ  from 
another  indoors;  your  magalia  in  Africa,  or  your  grottos  in  Syria, 
are  not  perfection.  I  suppose  you  did  not  come  to  Athens  to  swarm 
up  a  ladder,  or  to  grope  about  a  closet ;  you  came  to  see  and  to  hear 
what  hear  and  see  you  could  not  elsewhere.  What  food  for  the 
intellect  is  it  possible  to  procure  indoors,  that  you  stay  there  look- 
ing about  you?  Do  you  think  to  read  there?  Where  are  your 
books?  Do  you  expect  to  purchase  books  at  Athens? — You  are 
much  out  in  your  calculations.  True  it  is,  we  at  this  day  who  live 
in  the  nineteenth  century  have  the  books  of  Greece  as  a  perpetual 
memorial;  and  copies  there  have  been,  since  the  time  that  they 
were  written.  But  you  need  not  go  to  Athens  to  procure  them, 
nor  would  you  find  them  in  Athens.  Strange  to  say,  strange  to 
the  nineteenth  century,  that  in  the  age  of  Plato  and  Thucydides 
there  was  not,  it  is  said,  a  bookshop  in  the  whole  place;  nor  was 
the  book  trade  in  existence  till  the  very  time  of  Augustus.  Libra- 
ries, I  suspect,  were  the  bright  invention  of  Attalus  or  the  Ptole- 
mies;3 I  doubt  whether  Athens  had  a  library  till  the  reign  of 
Hadrian.    It  was  what  the  student  gazed  on,  what  he  heard,  what 

a  I  do  not  go  into  controversy  on  the  subject,  for  which  the  reader  must  have 
recourse  to  Lipsius,  Morhof,  Boeckh,  Bekker,  etc.;  and  this,  of  course,  applies 
to  whatever  historical  matter  I  introduce,  or  shall  introduce. 


58  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

he  caught  by  the  magic  of  sympathy,  not  what  he  read,  which  was 
the  education  furnished  by  Athens. 

He  leaves  his  narrow  lodging  early  in  the  morning,  and  not  till 
night,  if  even  then,  will  he  return.  It  is  but  a  crib  or  kennel,  in 
which  he  sleeps  when  the  weather  is  inclement  or  the  ground 
damp — in  no  respect  a  home.  And  he  goes  out  of  doors,  not  to 
read  the  day's  newspaper,  or  to  buy  the  gay  shilling  volume,  but 
to  imbibe  the  invisible  atmosphere  of  genius,  and  to  learn  by  heart 
the  oral  traditions  of  taste.  Out  he  goes ;  and,  leaving  the  tumble- 
down town  behind  him,  he  mounts  the  Acropolis  to  the  right,  or  he 
turns  to  the  Areopagus  on  the  left.  He  goes  to  the  Parthenon  to 
study  the  sculptures  of  Phidias;  to  the  temple  of  the  Dioscuri  to 
see  the  paintings  of  Polygnotus.  We,  indeed,  take  our  Sophocles 
or  Aeschylus  out  of  our  coat-pocket ;  but  if  our  sojourner  at  Athens 
would  understand  how  a  tragic  poet  can  write,  he  must  betake 
himself  to  the  theatre  on  the  south,  and  see  and  hear  the  drama 
literally  in  action.  Or  let  him  go  westward  to  the  Agora,  and  there 
he  will  hear  Lysias  or  Andocides  pleading,  or  Demosthenes  harangu- 
ing. He  goes  farther  west  still,  along  the  shade  of  those  noble 
planes  which  Cimon  has  planted  there;  and  he  looks  around  him 
at  the  statues  and  porticoes  and  vestibules,  each  by  itself  a  work  of 
genius  and  skill,  enough  to  be  the  making  of  another  city.  He 
passes  through  the  city  gate,  and  then  he  is  at  the  famous  Cerami- 
cus.  Here  are  the  tombs  of  the  mighty  dead;  and  here,  we  will 
suppose,  is  Pericles  himself,  the  most  elevated,  the  most  thrilling 
of  orators,  converting  a  funeral  oration  over  the  slain  into  a  philo- 
sophical panegyric  of  the  living. 

Onwards  he  proceeds  still ;  and  now  he  has  come  to  that  still  more 
celebrated  Academe,  which  has  bestowed  its  own  name  on  univer- 
sities down  to  this  day;  and  there  he  sees  a  sight  which  will  be 
graven  on  his  memory  till  he  dies.  Many  are  the  beauties  of  the 
place — the  groves,  and  the  statues,  and  the  temple,  and  the  stream 
of  the  Cephissus  flowing  by;  many  are  the  lessons  which  will  be 
taught  him  day  after  day  by  teacher  or  by  companion ;  but  his  eye 
is  just  now  arrested  by  one  object :  it  is  the  very  presence  of  Plato. 
He  does  not  hear  a  word  that  he  says;  he  does  not  care  to  hear; 
he  asks  neither  for  discourse  nor  disputation;  what  he  sees  is  a 
whole,  complete  in  itself,  not  to  be  increased  by  addition,  and 
greater  than  anything  else.  It  will  be  a  point  in  the  history  of 
his  life;  a  stay  for  his  memory  to  rest  on,  a  burning  thought  in 
his  heart,  a  bond  of  union  with  men  of  like  mind,  ever  afterwards. 
Such  is  the  spell  which  the  living  man  exerts  on  his  fellows,  for 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  59 

good  or  for  evil.  How  nature  impels  us  to  lean  upon  others, 
making  virtue,  or  genius,  or  name,  the  qualification  for  our  doing 
so!  A  Spaniard  is  said  to  have  traveled  to  Italy,  simply  to  see 
Livy ;  he  had  *his  fill  of  gazing,  and  then  went  back  again  home. 
Had  our  young  stranger  got  nothing  by  his  voyage  but  the  sight 
of  the  breathing  and  moving  Plato,  had  he  entered  no  lecture- 
room  to  hear,  no  gymnasium  to  converse,  he  had  got  some  measure 
of  education,  and  something  to  tell  of  to  his  grandchildren. 

But  Plato  is  not  the  only  sage,  nor  the  sight  of  him  the  only 
lesson  to  be  learned  in  this  wonderful  suburb.  It  is  the  region  and 
the  realm  of  philosophy.  Colleges  were  the  inventions  of  many 
centuries  later;  and  they  imply  a  sort  of  cloistered  life,  or  at  least 
a  life  of  rule,  scarcely  natural  to  an  Athenian.  It  was  the  boast 
of  the  philosophic  statesman  of  Athens  that  his  countrymen 
achieved  by  the  mere  force  of  nature  and  the  love  of  the  noble 
and  the  great  what  other  people  aimed  at  by  laborious  discipline; 
and  all  who  came  among  them  were  submitted  to  the  same  method 
of  education.  We  have  traced  our  student  on  his  wanderings  from 
the  Acropolis  to  the  Sacred  Way;  and  now  he  is  in  the  region  of 
the  schools.  No  awful  arch,  no  window  of  many-colored  lights, 
marks  the  seats  of  learning  there  or  elsewhere;  philosophy  lives 
out  of  doors.  No  close  atmosphere  oppresses  the  brain  or  inflames 
the  eyelid ;  no  long  session  stiffens  the  limbs.  Epicurus  is  reclining 
in  his  garden ;  Zeno  looks  like  a  divinity  in  his  porch ;  the  restless 
Aristotle,  on  the  other  side  of  the  city,  as  if  in  antagonism  to 
Plato,  is  walking  his  pupils  off  their  legs  in  his  Lyceum  by  the 
Ilissus.  Our  student  has  determined  on  entering  himself  as  a 
disciple  of  Theophrastus,  a  teacher  of  marvelous  popularity,  who 
has  brought  together  two  thousand  pupils  from  all  parts  of  the 
world.  He  himself  is  of  Lesbos;  for  masters,  as  well  as  students, 
come  hither  from  all  regions  of  the  earth — as  befits  a  university. 
How  could  Athens  have  collected  hearers  in  such  numbers  unless 
she  had  selected  teachers  of  such  power?  It  was  the  range  of 
territory,  which  the  notion  of  a  university  implies,  which  fur- 
nished both  the  quantity  of  the  one  and  the  quality  of  the  other. 
Anaxagoras  was  from  Ionia,  Carneades  from  Africa,  Zeno  from 
Cyprus,  Protagoras  from  Thrace,  and  Gorgias  from  Sicily. 
Andromachus  was  a  Syrian,  Proaeresius  an  Armenian,  Hilarius  a 
Bithynian,  Philiscus  a  Thessalian,  Hadrian  a  Syrian.  Rome  is 
celebrated  for  her  liberality  in  civil  matters ;  Athens  was  as  liberal 
in  intellectual.  There  was  no  narrow  jealousy  directed  against  a 
professor  because  he  was  not  an  Athenian.    Genius  and  talent  were 


60  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

the  qualifications;  and  to  bring  them  to  Athens  was  to  do  homage 
to  it  as  a  university.  There  was  a  brotherhood  and  a  citizen- 
ship of  mind. 

Mind  came  first,  and  was  the  foundation  of  the  academical 
polity;  but  it  soon  brought  along  with  it,  and  gathered  round 
itself,  the  gifts  of  fortune  and  the  prizes  of  life.  As  time  went 
on,  wisdom  was  not  always  sentenced  to  the  bare  cloak  of  Clean- 
thes;  but,  beginning  in  rags,  it  ended  in  fine  linen.  The  profes- 
sors became  honorable  and  rich;  and  the  students  ranged  them- 
selves under  their  names,  and  were  proud  of  calling  themselves 
their  countrymen.  The  University  was  divided  into  four  great 
nations,  as  the  mediaeval  antiquarian  would  style  them;  and  in 
the  middle  of  the  fourth  century,  Proaeresius  was  the  leader  or 
proctor  of  the  Attic,  Hephaestion  of  the  Oriental,  Epiphanius  of 
the  Arabic,  and  Diophantus  of  the  Pontic.  Thus  the  professors 
were  both  patrons  of  clients,  and  hosts  and  proxeni  of  strangers 
and  visitors,  as  well  as  masters  of  the  schools;  and  the  Cappado- 
cian,  Syrian,  or  Sicilian  youth  who  came  to  one  or  other  of  them 
would  be  encouraged  to  study  by  his  protection,  and  to  aspire  by 
his  example. 

Even  Plato,  when  the  schools  of  Athens  were  not  a  hundred 
years  old,  was  in  circumstances  to  enjoy  the  otium  cum  dignitate. 
He  had  a  villa  out  at  Heraclea;  and  he  left  his  patrimony  to  his 
school,  in  whose  hands  it  remained,  not  only  safe,  but  fructifying, 
a  marvelous  phenomenon  in  tumultuous  Greece,  for  the  long  space 
of  eight  hundred  years.  Epicurus,  too,  had  the  property  of  the 
gardens  where  he  lectured;  and  these,  too,  became  the  property  of 
his  sect.  But  in  Roman  times  the  chairs  of  grammar,  rhetoric, 
politics,  and  the  four  philosophies  were  handsomely  endowed  by 
the  State ;  some  of  the  professors  were  themselves  statesmen  or  high 
functionaries,  and  brought  to  their  favorite  study  senatorial  rank 
or  Asiatic  opulence. 

Patrons  such  as  these  can  compensate  to  the  Freshman,  in  whom 
we  have  interested  ourselves,  for  the  poorness  of  his  lodging  and 
the  turbulence  of  his  companions.  In  everything  there  is  a  better 
side  and  a  worse ;  in  every  place  a  disreputable  set  and  a  respect- 
able, and  the  one  is  hardly  known  at  all  to  the  other.  Men  come 
away  from  the  same  university,  at  this  day,  with  contradictory  im- 
pressions and  contradictory  statements,  according  to  the  society  they 
have  found  there.  If  you  believe  the  one,  nothing  goes  on  there 
as  it  should  be;  if  you  believe  the  other,  nothing  goes  on  as  it 
should  not.     Virtue,  however,  and  decency  are  at  least  in  the 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS  61 

minority  everywhere,  and  under  some  sort  of  a  cloud  or  disadvan- 
tage; and  this  being  the  ease,  it  is  so  much  gain  whenever  an 
Herodes  Atticus  is  found,  to  throw  the  influence  of  wealth  and 
station  on  the  side  even  of  a  decorous  philosophy.  A  consular 
man,  and  the  heir  of  an  ample  fortune,  this  Herod  was  content  to 
devote  his  life  to  a  professorship,  and  his  fortune  to  the  patronage 
of  literature.  He  gave  the  sophist  Polemo  about  eight  thousand 
pounds,  as  the  sum  is  calculated,  for  three  declamations.  He  built 
at  Athens  a  stadium  six  hundred  feet  long,  entirely  of  white  marble, 
and  capable  of  admitting  the  whole  population.  His  theatre, 
erected  to  the  memory  of  his  wife,  was  made  of  cedar  wood  curi- 
ously carved.  He  had  two  villas,  one  at  Marathon,  the  place  of  his 
birth,  about  ten  miles  from  Athens,  the  other  at  Cephissia,  at  the 
distance  of  six;  and  thither  he  drew  to  him  the  elite,  and  at  times 
the  whole  body  of  the  students.  Long  arcades,  groves  of  trees, 
clear  pools  for  the  bath,  delighted  and  recruited  the  summer 
visitor.  Never  was  so  brilliant  a  lecture-room  as  his  evening 
banqueting-hall ;  highly  connected  students  from  Rome  mixed  with 
the  sharp-witted  provincial  of  Greece  or  Asia  Minor;  and  the 
flippant  sciolist,  and  the  nondescript  visitor,  half  philosopher,  half 
tramp,  met  with  a  reception,  courteous  always,  but  suitable  to  his 
deserts.  Herod  was  noted  for  his  repartees ;  and  we  have  instances 
on  record  of  his  setting  down,  according  to  the  emergency,  both  the 
one  and  the  other. 

A  higher  line,  though  a  rarer  one,  was  that  allotted  to  the  youth- 
ful Basil.  He  was  one  of  those  men  who  seem  by  a  sort  of  fascina- 
tion to  draw  others  around  them  even  without  wishing  it.  One  might 
have  deemed  that  his  gravity  and  his  reserve  would  have  kept 
them  at  a  distance ;  but,  almost  in  spite  of  himself,  he  was  the  centre 
of  a  knot  of  youths,  who,  pagans  as  most  of  them  were,  used  Athens 
honestly  for  the  purpose  for  which  they  professed  to  seek  it;  and, 
disappointed  and  displeased  with  the  place  himself,  he  seems  never- 
theless to  have  been  the  means  of  their  profiting  by  its  advantages. 
One  of  these  was  Sophronius,  who  afterwards  held  a  high  office  in 
the  State;  Eusebius  was  another,  at  that  time  the  bosom  friend  of 
Sophronius,  and  afterwards  a  bishop.  Celsus,  too,  is  named,  who 
afterwards  was  raised  to  the  government  of  Cilicia  by  the  Emperor 
Julian.  Julian  himself — in  the  sequel,  of  unhappy  memory — was 
then  at  Athens,  and  known  at  least  to  St.  Gregory.  Another  Julian 
is  also  mentioned,  who  was  afterwards  commissioner  of  the  land-tax. 
Here  we  have  a  glimpse  of  the  better  kind  of  society  among  the 
students  of  Athens ;  and  it  is  to  the  credit  of  the  parties  composing 


62  JOHN  HENRY  NEWMAN 

it  that  such  young  men  as  Gregory  and  Basil,  men  as  intimately 
connected  with  Christianity  as  they  were  well  known  in  the  world, 
should  hold  so  high  a  place  in  their  esteem  and  love.  When  the  two 
saints  were  departing,  their  companions  came  around  them  with  the 
hope  of  changing  their  purpose.  Basil  persevered;  but  Gregory 
relented,  and  turned  back  to  Athens  for  a  season. 


VI 

THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES1 

By  Sib  Richard  Jebb 

The  debt  which  the  modern  world  owes  to  the  best  age  of  ancient 
Greece  is  well  summed  up  in  some  words  which  the  late  Professor 
Green  wrote  in  his  Prolegomena  to  Ethics:  'When  we  come  to  ask 
ourselves  what  are  the  essential  forms  in  which,  however  other- 
wise modified,  the  will  for  true  good — which  is  the  will  to  be  good — 
must  appear,  our  answer  follows  the  outlines  of  the  Greek  classifica- 
tion of  the  virtues.  It  is  the  will  to  know  what  is  true ;  to  make  what 
is  beautiful;  to  endure  pain  or  fear;  to  resist  the  allurements  of 
pleasure  (i.e.,  to  be  brave  and  temperate) — if  not,  as  the  Greek 
would  have  said,  in  the  service  of  the  State,  yet  in  some  form  of 
human  society; — to  take  for  oneself,  and  to  give  to  others,  of 
those  things  which  admit  of  being  given  and  taken,  not  what  one 
is  inclined  to  give  or  take,  but  what  is  due. ' 

Accepting  this  as  a  concise  description  of  the  Hellenic  ideal,  we 
find  that  the  period  during  which  it  was  most  fully  realized  was 
that  which  we  are  accustomed  to  call  the  age  of  Pericles.  The 
period  so  named  may  be  roughly  defined  as  extending  from  460 
to  430  B.  C.  Within  those  thirty  years  the  political  power  of 
Athens  culminated;  the  Athenians  developed  that  civic  life  which, 
as  sketched  in  the  great  oration  attributed  to  Pericles  by  Thucyd- 
ides,  made  Athens,  as  the  orator  says,  the  school  of  Greece,  and, 
as  we  moderns  might  add,  the  teacher  of  posterity;  within  those 
thirty  years  were  created  works  of  art,  in  literature,  in  architec- 
ture, and  in  sculpture,  which  the  world  has  ever  since  regarded  as 
unapproachable  masterpieces.  This  period,  so  relatively  short  and 
yet  so  prolific  in  varied  excellence,  followed  closely  on  the  war  in 
which  united  Greece  repelled  the  Persian  invasion.    It  immediately 

[i  This  lecture  was  delivered  at  Glasgow  in  March,  1889,  and  was  post- 
humously published  from  the  author's  manuscript  in  Jebb's  Essays  and 
Addresses  (Cambridge,  England,  1907).  It  is  here  reprinted  from  that  volume 
(pp.  104-126)  with  the  consent  of  the  Cambridge  University  Press. — Editor.] 


64  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

preceded  the  war  of  the  two  leading  Greek  cities  against  each  other, 
in  which  Sparta  ultimately  humbled  Athens.  Athens,  as  it  appears 
in  the  national  struggle  against  Persia,  is  not  yet  the  acknowledged 
head  of  Hellas.  The  formal  leadership  belongs,  by  common  con- 
sent, to  Sparta ;  and  though  Athens  is  already  pre-eminent  in  moral 
qualities — in  unselfish  devotion  to  the  national  cause,  and  in  a 
spirit  which  no  reverses  can  break, — these  qualities  appear  as  they 
are  embodied  in  a  few  ehosen  men,  in  a  Themistocles  and  an  Aris- 
tides;  the  mass  of  Athenians  whom  they  lead  is  still  a  compara- 
tively rude  multitude,  not  yet  quickened  into  the  full  energy  of 
conscious  citizenship.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  look  to  the  close 
of  the  age  of  Pericles. — if  we  pass  to  the  opening  years  of  the 
Peloponnesian  war — we  find  that  the  Athenian  democracy  already 
bears  within  it  the  seeds  of  decay.  The  process  of  degeneration 
has  already  begun,  though  a  century  is  still  to  elapse  before  Philip 
of  Macedon  shall  overthrow  the  liberties  of  Greece  at  Chaeronea. 
The  interval  between  the  Persian  war  and  the  Peloponnesian 
war — the  space  which  we  call  the  age  of  Pericles — is  a  space  of 
comparative  peace  and  rest,  during  which  all  the  faculties  of  the 
Hellenic  nature  attain  their  most  complete  development  in  the 
civic  community  of  Athens.  Yet  this  interval  is  the  only  period  in 
Athenian  history  of  which  we  have  no  full  or  continuous  record 
from  a  contemporary  source.  Herodotus  leaves  us  at  the  end  of  the 
Persian  invasion.  Thucydides  becomes  our  guide  only  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  Peloponnesian  war.  It  is  true  that  in  the  opening 
of  his  work  he  glances  rapidly  at  the  intervening  years.  But  his 
hints  serve  rather  to  stimulate  than  to  appease  our  curiosity.  "We 
learn  from  him  little  more  than  a  few  external  facts  which,  taken 
by  themselves,  tell  us  little.  With  regard  to  the  inner  life  of  Athens 
in  the  age  of  Pericles — the  social  and  the  intellectual  life — he  is 
silent.  Among  the  names  which  are  nowhere  mentioned  by  him 
are  those  of  the  poets  Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  Euripides,  Aris- 
tophanes; the  philosopher  Anaxagoras;  the  sculptor  Phidias;  the 
architect  Ictinus.  He  incidentally  notices  the  Parthenon — but  only 
as  a  treasury ;  he  notices  the  Propylaea — but  only  as  a  work  which 
had  reduced  the  balance  in  the  treasury.  This  silence,  however 
tantalizing  it  may  be  for  us,  admits  of  a  simple  explanation.  His 
chosen  subject,  as  he  conceived  it,  was  a  purely  political  one — the 
Peloponnesian  war;  and  he  did  not  regard  such  matters  as  perti- 
nent to  it.  The  art  and  poetry  of  the  day,  the  philosophy  and  the 
social  life,  were,  in  his  view,  merely  decorations  of  the  theatre  in 
which  the  great  drama  of  the  war  was  being  enacted.     One  thing, 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  65 

however,  he  allows  us  to  see  clearly — viz.,  that  the  'age  of  Pericles' 
is  fitly  so  called.  Even  in  his  slight  sketch,  a  central  and  com- 
manding figure  is  brought  before  us.  And  it  is  significant  that 
the  famous  Funeral  Oration  sums  up  all  that  Thucydides  tells  us 
as  to  the  life  of  Periclean  Athens.  It  is  as  if  he  felt  that  his 
own  silence  on  that  subject  should  be  broken  by  no  voice  save  that 
of  Pericles. 

Thus  it  comes  to  pass  that,  in  regard  to  the  age  of  Pericles,  we 
have  to  rely  mainly  on  two  sources  of  information.  On  the  one 
hand,  we  have  the  surviving  monuments  of  its  literature,  and  some 
fragments  of  its  art.  On  the  other  hand,  we  have  that  description 
of  its  general  tone  and  spirit  which  Thucydides  has  embodied  in 
the  Funeral  Oration.  But  this  description  is  only  in  general  terms. 
To  those  who  heard  it,  of  course,  its  abstract  statements  were  full 
of  vivid  meaning,  suggesting  a  thousand  familiar  details  of  their 
daily  life.  We  moderns,  however,  have  to  reconstruct  that  life  as 
best  we  may,  by  piecing  together  scattered  bits  of  evidence.  The 
questions  for  us  are :  What  were  the  aims  which  Pericles  set  before 
him  ?  By  what  means  did  he  succeed  in  so  impressing  his  own  ideas 
upon  his  age  that  the  period  has  ever  since  been  distinctively  asso- 
ciated with  his  name  ?  And  what  was  it  in  the  civic  life  thus  devel- 
oped which  made  its  atmosphere  so  incomparably  favorable  to  the 
creative  energies  of  the  intellect  ?  We  cannot  hope  to  answer  these 
questions  fully;  but  it  is  possible  to  suggest  some  considerations 
which  may  assist  clearness  of  thought  in  regard  to  them. 

First  of  all,  we  must  remember  the  idea  which  lay  at  the  root  of 
Greek  education  generally  in  the  period  before  the  Persian  wars. 
That  idea  was  a  free  cultivation  of  the  mental  and  bodily  powers, 
not  limited  or  specialized  by  a  view  to  any  particular  occupation  in 
after  life.  The  main  instruments  of  mental  cultivation  were  poetry 
and  music,  both  of  them  in  a  close  connection  with  the  traditional 
popular  religion.  The  instruments  of  physical  training  were  the 
exercises  of  the  palaestra.  When  the  youth  had  become  a  man,  his 
mental  education  was  tested  in  public  counsel  and  speech,  his  physi- 
cal training  in  military  service  for  the  State.  This  harmonious 
education  of  mind  and  body  on  certain  prescribed  lines  created  a 
general  Hellenic  tradition,  which  was  constantly  confirmed  by  the 
influence  of  the  festivals,  with  their  recitations  of  poetry  and  their 
athletic  contests.  Hellenes,  to  whatever  part  of  Hellas  they  be- 
longed, felt  themselves  united  by  a  common  descent,  a  common  reli- 
gion, a  common  language,  and  a  common  type  of  social  life.  The 
first  two  of  these  ties — descent  and  religion — were,  for  a  Greek, 


66  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

interdependent;  for  Greeks  conceived  themselves  as  sprung  from 
heroes,  and  these  heroes  as  sprung  from  the  gods;  thus,  in  Mr. 
Grote's  phrase,  the  ideas  of  ancestry  and  worship  coalesced.  It 
was  only  about  a  century  before  the  Persian  wars  that  this  primi- 
tive Hellenic  tone  of  mind  began  to  be  troubled  by  the  new  scep- 
ticism which  had  its  birth  in  Ionia.  The  Ionian  thinkers,  in  their 
attempts  to  solve  the  problem  of  the  universe,  gave  the  first  shock 
to  the  old  uncritical  acceptance  of  the  popular  theology.  People 
began  to  ask  whether  gods  could  do  such  things  as  they  were  said 
to  do;  whether  these  gods  were  more  than  symbols  or  fictions. 
Athens  does  not  seem  to  have  been  much  affected  by  Ionian  philoso- 
phy before  the  Persian  wars ;  though,  in  that  earlier  time,  the  social 
life  of  Athens  was  externally  more  Ionian  than  it  afterwards  be- 
came. And  the  effect  of  the  Persian  wars  on  Athens  was,  in  one 
way,  such  as  to  confirm  Athenian  adherence  to  traditional  modes 
of  thought.  Those  wars  had  brought  the  sturdy  Attic  husbandmen 
to  the  front — the  men  in  whom  the  old  Attic  beliefs  were  strong- 
est; while  at  the  same  time  Athenians  had  become  conscious  of 
their  superiority  to  the  Ionians,  the  vassals  of  Xerxes,  whom  they 
had  routed  at  Salamis.  A  feeling  was  thus  generated  strongly 
antagonistic  to  innovation,  especially  when  it  appeared  irreligious, 
and  when  it  came  from  Ionia.  This,  however,  was  not  the  only 
effect  which  the  Persian  wars  left  behind  them.  In  those  struggles, 
the  Athenian  powers  of  mind  and  body  had  been  strained  to  the 
uttermost.  When  the  effort  was  over,  the  sense  of  stimulated  activi- 
ties remained;  it  was  no  longer  easy  to  acquiesce  in  the  routine  of 
ancestral  usage ;  there  was  a  desire  for  an  enlargement  of  the  mental 
horizon,  an  eagerness  to  enter  new  fields  of  endeavor,  correspond- 
ing to  the  new  consciousness  of  power.  Thus,  especially  in  minds 
of  the  higher  order,  a  welcome  was  prepared  for  intellectual  novel- 
ties. It  is  significant  that  the  Ionian  Anaxagoras,  the  foremost 
speculative  thinker  of  the  time,  chose  Athens  as  the  most  congenial 
abode  that  he  could  find.  "We  note  also  how  eagerly  Athens  received 
from  Sicily  the  new  art  of  rhetoric,  and  from  Ionia  the  practical 
culture  brought  by  the  so-called  Sophists. 

This  sympathy  with  innovation,  and  on  the  other  hand  a  newly 
reinforced  conservatism,  were  the  forces  which  divided  Athens  at 
the  moment  when  Pericles  entered  public  life.  His  father,  Xan- 
thippus,  belonged  to  the  old  nobility  of  Attica,  the  Eupatridae. 
His  mother,  Agariste,  was  a  member  of  a  family  who  belonged  to 
the  younger  nobility,  the  Alcmaeonidae,  and  had  latterly  been  iden- 
tified with  the  popular  party;  Agariste  was  a  niece  of  the  great 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  67 

reformer  Clisthenes.  Thus,  while  the  maternal  descent  of  Pericles 
would  recommend  him  to  the  party  of  progress,  his  lineage  on  the 
father's  side  was  a  claim  to  the  respect  of  their  opponents.  In  his 
character,  from  youth  onwards,  one  of  the  strongest  traits  seems 
to  have  been  an  unceasing  desire  of  knowledge;  he  sought  knowl- 
edge, however,  not  as  Goethe  did — to  whom,  in  some  aspects,  he 
might  be  compared — with  a  view  merely  to  satisfying  his  own 
intellectual  needs,  but  rather  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  states- 
man— in  order  to  strengthen  the  mental  powers  by  which  he  aspired 
to  guide  the  course  of  the  city.  Another  quality  which  distin- 
guished him  was  self-restraint.  In  pursuing  his  aims,  he  showed 
the  highest  degree  of  patience,  moderation,  and  self-denial.  The 
natural  fire  of  his  temperament,  which  flashed  out  at  times  in  his 
oratory,  was  perfectly  under  the  control  of  his  judgment.  His 
career  may  be  divided  into  two  parts.  During  the  first,  down  to 
444  B.  C,  Pericles  appears  as  a  party  man — as  the  leader  of  the 
reformers.  From  444  B.  C.  to  his  death  in  429  B.  C.  he  occupies  a 
position  raised  above  party,  and  has  the  government  of  Athens 
virtually  concentrated  in  his  hands.  Let  us  consider  the  nature  of 
the  reforms  with  which  he  was  associated,  or  which  he  initiated, 
during  the  earlier  part  of  his  career.  First  of  all,  the  Council  of 
the  Areopagus  was  deprived  of  certain  general  powers  which 
rendered  it  a  stronghold  of  the  party  opposed  to  change.  Next, 
it  was  provided  that  the  State  should  make  a  small  payment  to 
every  citizen  for  each  day  on  which  he  served  as  a  juror  in  the 
law-courts,  or  attended  the  meetings  of  the  public  assembly;  also, 
that  the  State  should  supply  to  every  citizen  who  required  it  the 
sum  needful  to  procure  his  admission  to  the  theatre  at  the  public 
festivals.  In  modern  eyes  these  measures  may  not  seem  very  impor- 
tant. But  in  reality  they  constituted  a  revolution  of  the  most 
momentous  kind.  In  order  to  see  this,  we  have  only  to  recall  a 
broad  difference  between  the  ancient  and  modern  conceptions  of 
the  State.  A  British  citizen  does  not  feel  himself  the  less  so  if 
he  happens  to  have  no  direct  share  in  the  central  conduct  of  public 
affairs.  When  he  speaks  of  the  State  in  its  active  capacity,  he  com- 
monly means  the  Executive  Power.  He  may  fully  recognize  that  he 
ought  to  live,  and,  if  need  be,  die,  for  his  country ;  but,  unless  he  is  a 
person  of  exceptional  temperament,  the  thought  of  the  State  as  a 
parent  thus  entitled  to  his  devotion  is  not  habitually  present  to 
him  in  everyday  life;  it  is  in  a  colder  and  more  prosaic  aspect 
that  the  State,  is  chiefly  familiar  to  his  thoughts — viz.,  as  an  insti- 
tution to  which  he  owes  certain  duties,  and  from  which  he  receives 


68  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

certain  rights.  But  in  the  theory  of  the  ancient  Greek  State,  the 
citizen's  whole  life  was  most  intimately  identified  with  the  life  of 
the  city.  The  city  was  a  larger  family,  to  which  every  member 
was  bound  by  a  supreme  obligation,  overriding  all  private  con- 
siderations of  every  kind.  Further,  a  citizen  was  not  regarded  as 
enjoying  full  citizenship  unless  he  had  a  direct  personal  share  in 
public  affairs — either  continuously,  or  at  least  in  his  turn.  No 
such  thing  as  representative  government  was  known;  the  civic 
assembly  was  open  to  all  citizens,  and  a  citizen  could  use  his  fran- 
chise only  by  speaking  or  voting  in  person.  Such  was  the  theory ; 
in  practice,  however,  it  was  modified  in  various  ways  by  various 
circumstances.  If  we  look  back  to  the  earlier  days  of  Greece, 
before  the  age  of  Pericles,  we  perceive  the  prevalence  of  a  feeling 
which  tended  practically  to  disfranchise  many  of  those  who,  by 
birth,  were  citizens — a  feeling,  namely,  that  the  possession  of  inde- 
pendent means,  up  to  a  certain  point,  should  be  a  qualification 
for  taking  part  in  public  life. 

At  Athens,  in  the  time  of  the  Periclean  reforms,  there  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  much  civic  pauperism.  A  hundred  and  fifty 
years  or  so  before,  Solon's  great  agrarian  reform  had  taken  a  load 
of  debt  off  the  cultivators  of  the  soil,  and  had  done  much  to  limit 
the  size  of  landed  estates.  In  the  days  of  Pericles  probably  more 
than  one-half  of  the  Attic  citizen-body  were  owners  of  land.  It 
was  a  law  that  every  Athenian  citizen  should  bring  up  his  son  to 
some  calling  or  trade  by  which  he  could  subsist.  "With  its  har- 
bors and  its  fleet,  Athens  had  unrivaled  opportunities  for  com- 
merce. But  Pericles  saw  that,  if  the  encouragement  of  industry 
and  commerce  was  truly  to  strengthen  the  city,  the  artisan  and  the 
merchant  must  feel  that  they  were  in  deed,  and  not  merely  in  name, 
citizens.  The  unity  of  the  State  must  be  realized  as  far  as  possible 
according  to  the  Greek  idea;  that  is,  every  citizen  must  have  some 
personal  share  in  public  business.  Here,  however,  a  grave  diffi- 
culty encountered  him.  A  poor  citizen  could  not  be  expected  to 
serve  as  a  juror  in  the  law-courts,  or  to  attend  the  public  assembly, 
if  such  public  duties  were  to  suspend  the  pursuit  of  his  private 
calling.  This  difficulty  was  met  by  the  proposal  of  Pericles  to 
pay  the  citizen  for  the  time  which  he  gave  to  the  State.  The  pay- 
ment was  extremely  small;  at  first  it  was  one  obol,  a  little  more 
than  V&d.  for  each  day  in  the  law-courts  or  in  the  assembly;  it 
was  afterwards  raised  to  about  4%d.  At  this  time  the  average  day's 
wage  of  an  Athenian  artisan  was  about  ninepence.  The  public 
assembly  met,  as  a  rule,  only  four  times  a  month.    The  jury-courts 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  69 

sat  almost  every  day.  Every  year  5000  citizens,  with,  a  further 
reserve  of  1000,  were  chosen  by  lot,  as  the  body  from  which  the 
juries  for  that  year  should  be  drawn ;  and  a  man  who  was  in  that 
body  could  do  but  little  work  at  his  trade  during  that  year.  Thus, 
notwithstanding  the  small  payment  from  the  State,  he  was  serv- 
ing the  State  at  a  sacrifice.  Neither  in  that  case,  nor  in  regard 
to  the  public  assembly,  was  he  under  any  temptation  to  abandon  his 
trade,  and  to  live  on  the  State  bounty.  Pericles  had  foreseen  that 
danger,  and  had  guarded  against  it  by  the  scale  of  payment.  A 
century  later,  the  public  pay  had  become  a  mischief ;  but  that  mis- 
chief was  rather  the  result  than  the  cause  of  social  disorganization. 
Now,  then,  we  can  understand  the  full  significance  of  the  words 
which  Thucydides  puts  into  the  mouth  of  Pericles.  'An  Athenian 
citizen,'  he  says,  'does  not  neglect  the  State  because  he  takes  care 
of  his  own  household;  and  even  those  who  are  engaged  in  business 
(Ipya)  can  form  a  very  fair  idea  of  politics.  We  regard  a  man 
who  takes  no  interest  in  public  affairs  as  a  useless  man ;  and  if  few 
of  us  are  originators  of  a  policy,  we  are  all  sound  judges  of  it.'2 
Not  less  essential  to  the  statesman 's  purpose  was  the  measure  which 
ensured  the  presence  of  the  poorer  citizens  at  the  public  festivals, 
when  tragedy  or  comedy  was  performed  in  the  theatre  of  Dionysus. 
This  theatre-money  has  rightly  been  compared  to  modern  grants 
in  aid  of  education,  or  to  the  remission  of  school-fees.  At  these 
festivals,  which  were  religious  ceremonies  animated  by  the  noblest 
poetry,  the  citizen  felt  himself  a  sharer  in  the  best  spiritual  inher- 
itance of  the  city.  The  Thucydidean  Pericles  alludes  to  this  when 
he  says:  '"We  have  provided  for  a  weary  mind  many  relaxations 
from  toil,  in  the  festivals  and  sacrifices  which  we  hold  throughout 
the  year.'3  If  we  are  inclined  to  be  surprised  at  the  extreme 
smallness  of  the  State-payments  above  noticed,  and  to  ask  how 
they  could  make  any  appreciable  difference,  we  must  remember 
three  things:  first,  that  the  purchasing  power  of  money  was  im- 
mensely greater  then  than  it  is  now;  next,  that  ancient  civiliza- 
tion rested  on  a  basis  of  slavery,  without  which  the  full  develop- 
ment of  the  Attic  democracy  would  have  been  impossible;  lastly, 
we  must  remember  the  genuine  frugality  and  simplicity  of  Athe- 
nian life — greatly  favored,  as  it  was,  by  a  happy  climate — the  sim- 
plicity to  which  Pericles  refers  when  he  says :  '  We  are  lovers  of  the 
beautiful,  yet  simple  in  our  tastes,  and  we  cultivate  the  mind  with- 
out loss  of  manliness. '    In  the  same  Funeral  Oration,  indeed,  Peri- 

2  Thucydides  2.  40. 
a  Ibid.  2.38. 


70  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

cles  speaks  of  the  beautiful  objects  which  surrounded  Athenians  in 
their  private  houses — objects  of  which  the  daily  delight,  as  he  says, 
banishes  gloom;  but  it  would  be  an  error  to  imagine  that  these 
words  could  apply  only  to  the  homes  of  the  richer  citizens;  noth- 
ing was  more  characteristic  of  Greek  art  than  the  skill  with  which 
it  gave  lovely  forms  to  the  cheapest  and  homeliest  articles  of 
daily  use. 

The  great  work,  then,  which  Pericles  achieved  during  his  period 
of  political  struggle  might  be  briefly  characterized  as  follows.  He 
realized  the  essential  idea  of  the  Greek  city  more  fully  than  it  had 
ever  been  realized  before,  or  was  ever  realized  after;  and  he  did 
this  by  enabling  every  citizen,  poor  no  less  than  rich,  to  feel  that 
he  was  a  citizen  indeed,  taking  his  part  in  the  work  of  the  city 
without  undue  sacrifice  of  his  private  interests,  and  sharing  in  the 
noblest  enjoyments  which  the  city  had  to  offer. 

The  second  part  of  the  career  of  Pericles  dates  from  the  banish- 
ment of  Thucydides,  son  of  Melesias,  in  444  B.  C.  That  event 
marked  the  final  triumph  of  the  reformers,  and  left  Pericles  with- 
out even  the  semblance  of  a  political  rival.  The  contemporary 
historian  describes  the  position  of  affairs  by  saying  that  Athens 
was  now  nominally  governed  by  a  democracy,  but  really  by  her 
foremost  citizen.  The  position  of  Pericles  was  now,  in  fact,  such 
as  would  be  that  of  an  immensely  popular  Prime  Minister  who  not 
only  commanded  an  overwhelming  majority  in  Parliament,  but 
who  could  look  forward  to  a  tenure  of  power  limited  only  by  his 
own  vitality.  The  recent  defeat  of  the  party  opposed  to  Pericles 
was  only  one  of  the  facts  which  help  to  explain  this  unique  ascen- 
dancy. It  is  certain  that  he  must  have  possessed  one  of  the  greatest 
and  most  versatile  intellects  ever  given  to  man.  On  no  other  hypoth- 
esis can  we  explain  the  extraordinary  impression  which  he  made 
on  the  ablest  of  his  contemporaries,  and  the  unequaled  reputation 
which  he  left  behind  him.  Then  his  moral  qualities  were  not  only 
great  in  themselves,  but  peculiarly  fitted  to  impress  his  country- 
men. He  was,  as  Thucydides  says  with  emphasis,  of  stainless  per- 
sonal integrity.  His  private  life  was  entirely  free  from  ostentation. 
He  was  rarely  seen  at  public  festivals ;  indeed,  he  was  seldom  seen 
at  all,  except  at  his  public  work,  or  on  his  way  to  it.  He  was  com- 
pared by  contemporary  wits  to  the  'Salaminia' — a  ship,  employed 
in  State  service,  which  appeared  only  on  great  occasions.  He  gave 
no  opening  to  the  jealousy  of  fellow-citizens,  and  at  the  same  time 
never  risked  his  hold  on  their  respect — acting  in  the  spirit  of 
Henry  the  Fourth 's  advice  to  his  son : 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  71 

Had  I  so  lavish  of  my  presence  been, 
So  common-hackneyed  in  the  eyes  of  men, 
So  stale  and  cheap  to  vulgar  company, 
Opinion,  that  did  help  me  to  the  crown, 
Had  still  kept  loyal  to  possession.4 

In  manner,  we  are  told,  he  was  grave  and  reserved;  his  public 
speaking  was  marked  by  a  studious  terseness,  which,  however,  did 
not  prevent  him  from  rising,  when  strongly  moved,  into  majestic 
eloquence,  adorned  by  bold  and  striking  imagery,  of  which  a  few 
examples  remain.  His  quick-witted  and  excitable  fellow-citizens 
were  held  in  awe  by  the  massive  mind  which  they  felt  under  his 
grave  calm — a  calm  which  sometimes  gave  place  to  the  rushing 
impulse  of  great  thoughts,  but  never  to  irritation,  even  when  the 
provocation  was  sorest.  Hegel  says  of  him :  '  To  be  the  first  man 
in  the  State,  among  this  noble,  free,  and  cultivated  people  of 
Athens,  was  the  good  fortune  of  Pericles.  Of  all  that  is  great  for 
humanity,  the  greatest  thing  is  to  dominate  the  wills  of  men  who 
have  wills  of  their  own.' 

At  the  time  when  Pericles  became  thus  virtually  supreme,  Athens 
had  reached  a  position  wholly  different  from  that  which  she  had 
held  before  the  Persian  wars.  Then,  she  was  merely  the  chief  town 
of  Attica,  a  small  district,  of  little  natural  wealth.  But  in  the 
course  of  the  last  thirty  years  she  had  become  an  imperial  city,  the 
head  of  a  great  confederacy  which  embraced  the  islands  and  coasts 
of  the  Aegean  Sea.  The  common  treasury  of  the  league  had  been 
removed  from  the  Island  of  Delos  to  Athens,  and  located  in  the 
temple  of  Athena  on  the  Acropolis.  This  transfer — a  bold  step 
which  Pericles  had  strongly  advocated — was  a  formal  recognition 
of  Athens  as  the  capital  of  a  wide  empire.  Almost  all  the  cities 
which  had  originally  been  her  free  allies  had  now  become  her  sub- 
jects; year  by  year  their  tribute  flowed  to  the  temple  on  her  cita- 
del. And  these  revenues  were  administered  by  Athenian  officials, 
subject  to  the  authority  of  Athens.  The  revenues  proper  to  Athens 
herself  had  been  greatly  enlarged  by  the  development  of  the  silver 
mines  of  Laurium  in  Attica,  and  by  the  acquisition  of  gold  mines 
in  Thrace.  Thus  the  organization  of  finance  had  assumed  a  new 
political  importance.  It  should  be  noticed  that  the  idea  of  a  public 
treasure — a  permanent  store  on  which  the  State  could  draw  in 
emergencies — had  not  hitherto  been  fully  worked  out  in  a  Greek 
democracy.    The  economical  basis  of  the  old  Greek  commonwealth 

*  [Shakespeare,  1  Henry  IV  3.  2.  39-43— Editor.] 


72  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

was  different  from  that  to  which  we  are  accustomed.  The  Greek 
city  was,  in  this  aspect,  more  like  a  corporation  possessing  prop- 
erty, and  paying  its  current  expenses  out  of  that  property.  The 
Greek  citizens  were  like  joint  administrators  of  a  trust  fund,  for 
the  common  benefit.  To  take  a  modern  illustration  on  a  small  scale, 
we  might  compare  them  to  the  Fellows  of  a  College,  in  whom  is 
vested  the  administration  of  the  College  property.  The  Greek  city 
depended  very  little  on  direct  taxation  of  the  citizen.  Hence  it  had 
small  opportunities  of  forming  a  public  reserve  fund  of  any  magni- 
tude. That  would  have  had  to  be  done  mainly  out  of  its  annual 
income,  and  at  the  cost  of  retrenchments  which  would  not  have 
been  generally  popular.  Of  course,  where  a  despot  had  contrived 
to  obtain  the  supreme  power  in  a  Greek  city,  he  could  exact  from 
his  subjects  the  means  wherewith  to  form  a  public  treasure. 
Pisistratus  did  so,  when  he  was  despot  of  Athens;  so  also  did  the 
Sicilian  despots,  and  many  more.  Thus,  a  power  based  on  money 
had  hitherto  in  Greece  been  characteristic  of  a  tyranny,  not  of  a 
free  commonwealth.  But  Pericles  saw  that  the  imperial  position 
of  Athens,  and  the  naval  power  on  which  her  empire  rested,  could 
be  secured  only  by  creating  a  public  reserve  fund  on  an  adequate 
scale.  And  since  the  tribute  paid  by  the  subject  allies  was  now  at 
the  absolute  disposal  of  Athens ;  since,  further,  in  any  emergencies 
that  might  arise,  the  interests  of  Athens  would  be  identified  with 
those  of  her  dependents ;  it  was  now  comparatively  easy  for  a  states- 
man to  effect  this  object.  He  was  further  assisted  by  the  peculiar 
relation  which  existed  between  public  finance  and  religion.  The 
temples  were  the  public  banks  of  ancient  Greece;  the  safest  places 
of  deposit.  Under  the  provisions  made  by  Pericles,  the  public 
funds  lodged  in  the  temple  of  Athena  on  the  citadel  were  of  three 
kinds.  First,  the  fund  designed  to  meet  the  current  expenses  of  the 
State,  which  were  consigned  merely  to  the  temporary  guardianship 
of  the  goddess.  Secondly,  there  were  moneys  which  were  formally 
consecrated  to  Athena,  and  which  were  made  her  own  property. 
These  could  not  be  touched,  except  by  way  of  loan  from  the  goddess, 
and  under  a  strict  obligation  to  repay  her ;  to  take  them  in  any  other 
way  would  have  been  sacrilege.  Thirdly,  there  were  certain  defi- 
nite sums,  also  consecrated  to  her,  which  could  not  even  be  bor- 
rowed from  her,  except  in  certain  specified  cases  of  extreme  need — 
as  if,  for  example,  a  hostile  fleet  threatened  the  Piraeus.  The  care 
of  these  funds,  and  the  administration  of  all  the  other  sources  of 
Athenian  revenue,  were  organized  under  Pericles  on  a  complete 
and  elaborate  system.    Thus  it  was  his  merit  to  secure  for  a  free 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  73 

State  that  financial  stability  which  had  elsewhere  been  only  a 
pillar  of  despotism.  We  see  an  immediate  result  of  this  in  the 
simple  fact  that  the  Peloponnesian  war  lasted  twenty-seven  years. 
Without  the  treasure  on  the  Acropolis,  the  naval  resources  of 
Athens  must  have  collapsed  in  a  very  much  shorter  time. 

I  can  but  touch  briefly  on  the  part  which  colonization  played  in 
the  policy  of  Pericles.  His  principle  was  to  avoid  enlarging  the 
empire,  but  to  bind  the  existing  empire  together  as  strongly  as 
possible.  When  cities  which  had  revolted  against  Athens  had  been 
subdued,  their  territory  was  in  some  cases  confiscated  by  Athens. 
Such  land  was  then  divided  into  a  certain  number  of  allotments. 
Athenian  citizens  of  the  poorer  class,  who  wished  for  allotments, 
were  then  asked  to  send  in  their  names,  and  the  holdings  were 
assigned  by  ballot.  A  successful  applicant  could  do  either  of  two 
things.  He  could  go  out  and  farm  the  land  himself ;  in  which  case 
the  State  helped  him  with  his  outfit.  Or  he  could  stay  at  Athens, 
and  make  the  former  owner  of  the  foreign  land  his  tenant.  In 
either  case  he  retained  his  full  rights  as  an  Athenian  citizen; 
whereas  in  an  ordinary  colony  the  Athenian  emigrant  became  a 
citizen  of  the  new  settlement.  Moreover,  the  ownership  of  the 
allotment  was  hereditary. 

All  things  naturally  conspired  at  this  period  to  make  Athens 
the  great  Hellenic  centre  of  industry  and  of  commerce.  The 
Piraeus,  the  harbor  town  of  Athens,  with  its  magnificent  port,  was 
the  market  to  which  all  commodities  flowed  from  East  and  West. 
From  the  Euxine  came  cargoes  of  fish  or  of  hides;  papyrus  came 
from  Egypt,  frankincense  from  Syria,  dates  from  Phoenicia,  ores 
from  Cyprus,  silphium  from  Cyrene;  Thrace  sent  timber;  Sicily 
and  the  Aegean  islands  sent  their  fruits,  wines,  and  other  luxuries. 
Athens  itself  had  a  special  repute  for  earthenware,  for  some  kinds 
of  metal  work,  and  for  work  in  leather.  It  is  not  surprising,  then, 
that  Athens  began  to  suffer  from  an  inconvenience  which  at  the 
present  day  is  felt  on  a  greater  scale  in  the  United  States — viz., 
the  influx  of  aliens,  anxious  to  share  in  the  advantages  of  citizen- 
ship. Pericles  checked  this  evil  by  reviving  the  old  rule,  which  had 
long  fallen  into  disuse,  viz.,  that  full  citizenship  could  be  enjoyed 
only  by  a  person,  both  of  whose  parents  were  of  Attic  birth.  A 
reinforcement  of  this  rule,  though  unpopular  at  first,  was  made 
comparatively  easy  by  the  favorable  conditions  granted  to  aliens 
who  wished  to  fix  their  abode  at  Athens. 

Thus  far  we  have  been  considering  Periclean  Athens  chiefly  as 
the  most  perfect  example  of  Greek  civic  life;  as  an  imperial  city, 


74  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

in  which  the  fullest  individual  freedom  was  enjoyed  without  pre- 
judice to  the  strength  of  the  State ;  as  a  great  seat  of  industry  and 
a  focus  of  commerce.  The  memorials  of  all  these  things  have  well- 
nigh  vanished ;  but  the  modern  world  still  possesses  monuments  of 
the  literature,  and  at  least  fragments  of  the  art,  which  proclaim 
Athens  to  have  been,  above  all,  the  great  intellectual  centre  of  that 
age.  The  influence  of  Periclean  Athens  is  deeply  impressed  on  the 
History  of  Herodotus,  and  moulded  the  still  greater  work  of 
Thucydides;  Athens  was  the  home  of  the  philosopher  Anaxagoras, 
and  the  astronomer  Meton;  it  was  at  Athens  that  prose  composi- 
tion, which  had  hitherto  been  either  colloquial  or  poetical,  was  first 
matured;  at  Athens,  too,  oratory  first  became  the  effective  ally  of 
statesmanship ;  both  tragedy  and  comedy  were  perfected ;  the 
frescoes  of  Polygnotus,  the  architecture  of  Ictinus,  the  sculpture  of 
Phidias,  combined  to  adorn  the  city;  and  when  we  think  of  these 
great  writers  and  artists,  we  must  remember  that  they  are  only 
some  of  the  more  eminent  out  of  a  larger  number  who  were  all 
living  at  Athens  within  the  same  period  of  thirty  years.  How  far 
can  this  wonderful  fact  be  directly  connected  with  the  influence 
of  the  political  work  done  by  Pericles,  or  with  the  personal  influ- 
ence of  the  man  ?  We  must  beware  of  exaggerating  such  influences. 
Statesmanship  may  encourage  men  of  genius,  but  it  cannot  make 
them.  "When  we  look  back  on  that  age,  we  seem  to  recognize  in 
its  abounding  and  versatile  brilliancy  rather  the  golden  time  of  a 
marvelously  gifted  race,  than  merely  the  attraction  which  a  city 
of  unique  opportunities  exercised  over  the  rest  of  the  world.  The 
great  national  victory  over  Persia  had  raised  the  vital  energy  of 
the  Greek  spirit  to  the  highest.  But  we  must  also  recollect  that, 
owing  to  the  very  nature  of  Greek  literature  and  art,  such  a  city 
as  the  Athens  of  Pericles  could  do  more  for  it  than  any  modern 
city  could  do  for  modern  art  or  literature.  Greek  literature  was 
essentially  spontaneous,  the  free  voice  of  life,  restrained  in  its 
freedom  only  by  a  sense  of  measure  which  was  part  of  the  Greek 
nature ;  the  Greek  poet,  or  historian,  or  philosopher,  was  not  merely 
a  man  of  letters  in  the  narrower  modern  meaning  of  the  term ;  he 
was  first,  and  before  all  things,  a  citizen,  in  close  sympathy,  usually 
in  active  contact,  with  the  public  life  of  the  city.  For  a  Greek, 
therefore,  as  poet  or  historian  or  philosopher,  nothing  could  be 
more  directly  important  than  that  this  public  life  should  be  as 
noble  as  possible ;  since,  the  nobler  it  was,  the  higher  and  the  more 
invigorating  was  the  source  from  which  he  drew  his  inspiration. 
Among  the  great  literary  men  who  belonged  to  the  age  of  Pericles, 


THE  AGE  OF  PERICLES  75 

there  are  especially  two  who  may  be  regarded  as  representative  of 
it — its  chief  historian  and  its  most  characteristic  poet — Thucydides 
and  Sophocles.  The  mind  of  Thucydides  had  been  moulded  by  the 
ideas  of  Pericles,  and  probably  in  large  measure  by  personal  inter- 
course with  him.  We  recognize  the  Periclean  stamp  in  the  clear- 
ness with  which  Thucydides  perceives  that  the  vital  thing  for  a 
state  is  the  spirit  in  which  it  is  governed;  and  that,  apart  from 
this  spirit,  there  is  no  certain  efficacy  in  the  form  of  a  constitution, 
no  sovereign  spell  in  the  name.  In  Sophocles,  again,  we  feel  the 
Periclean  influence  working  with  the  same  general  tendency  as  in 
the  plastic  arts;  he  holds  with  the  ancient  traditions  of  piety,  but 
invests  them  with  a  more  spiritual  and  more  intellectual  meaning. 
With  regard  to  the  fine  arts,  it  was  the  resolve  of  Pericles  that 
they  should  find  their  supreme  and  concentrated  manifestation  in 
the  embellishment  of  Athens.  Thucydides,  with  all  his  reticence  as 
to  art,  is  doubtless  a  faithful  interpreter  of  the  spirit  in  which  that 
work  was  done,  when  he  makes  Pericles  speak  of  the  abiding  monu- 
ments which  will  attest  to  all  posterity  the  achievements  of  that 
age.  This  feeling  was  not  prompted  merely  by  Athenian  patriot- 
ism ;  Athens  was  the  city  which  the  Persian  invader,  bent  on  aveng- 
ing Sardis,  had  twice  laid  in  ruins.  The  fact  that  Athens  should 
have  risen  from  its  ashes  in  unrivaled  strength  and  grace  was,  as 
Pericles  might  well  feel,  the  most  impressive  of  all  testimonies  to 
the  victory  of  Hellene  over  barbarian. 

When  Pericles  reached  his  full  power  the  port  of  Athens  was 
already  a  handsome  town,  with  regular  streets,  spacious  porticoes, 
large  open  spaces  and  perfectly  equipped  harbors.  But  the  Upper 
City — Athens  proper, — with  which  the  Piraeus  was  connected  by 
the  long  walls,  remained  comparatively  poor  in  ornament.  It  still 
showed  some  traces  of  the  haste  with  which  it  had  been  rebuilt 
after  the  Persian  wars.  Now,  under  the  guiding  influence  of 
Pericles,  architects,  sculptors,  and  painters  combined  in  adorning 
it.  That  which  gave  its  distinctive  stamp  to  their  work  was,  ulti- 
mately, the  great  idea  which  animated  them.  Its  inspiration  was 
the  idea  of  the  imperial  city,  Athens,  as  represented  and  defended 
by  the  goddess  Athena;  the  Athens  which,  with  the  aid  of  gods 
and  heroes,  had  borne  the  foremost  part  in  rolling  back  the  tide  of 
barbarian  invasion. 

In  no  other  instance  which  history  records,  has  art  of  a  supreme 
excellence  sprung  from  a  motive  at  once  so  intelligible  to  the  whole 
people,  and  so  satisfying  to  the  highest  order  of  minds. 

It  is  well  to  remember  that  the  story  of  Greece  was  not  closed 


76  SIR  RICHARD  JEBB 

when  the  Greek  genius  reached  the  brief  term  of  its  creative  activ- 
ity. It  is  well  to  follow  the  work  of  the  Greek  mind  through  later 
periods  also ;  but  those  qualities  which  were  distinctive  of  its  great- 
ness can  best  be  studied  when  the  Greek  mind  was  at  its  best. 
That  period  was  unquestionably  the  Fifth  Century  before  Christ — 
the  Age  of  Pericles. 


VII 

THE  ATTIC  AUDIENCE  » 

By  Arthur  Elam  Haigh 

Another  point  which  was  required  from  ancient  actors  was  great 
distinctness  in  the  articulation  of  the  separate  words,  and  a  careful 
observance  of  the  rhythm  and  metre  of  the  verses.  In  this  respect 
the  Athenians  were  a  most  exacting  audience.  Cicero  speaks  of 
their  'refined  and  scrupulous  ear,'  their  'sound  and  uncorrupted 
taste.'  Ancient  audiences  in  general  had  a  much  keener  ear  for 
the  melody  of  verse  than  is  to  be  found  in  a  modern  theatre.  A 
slovenly  recitation  of  poetry,  and  a  failure  to  emphasize  the  metre, 
would  not  have  been  tolerated  by  them.  Cicero  remarks  on  the  fact 
that,  though  the  mass  of  the  people  knew  nothing  about  the  theory 
of  versification,  their  instinctive  feeling  for  rhythmical  utterance 
was  wonderfully  keen.  He  says  that  if  an  actor  should  spoil  the 
metre  in  the  slightest  degree,  by  making  a  mistake  about  a  quan- 
tity, or  by  dropping  or  inserting  a  syllable,  there  would  be  a  storm 
of  disapproval  from  the  audience.2    No  such  sensitiveness  is  to  be 

[i  These  three  passages  are  taken  from  The  Attic  Theatre  (pp.  275-276; 
323-325;  343-348)  by  A.  E.  Haigh.  Third  edition,  revised  and  in  part  re- 
written by  A.  W.  Pickard-Cambridge,  Oxford,  1907.  They  are  reprinted  with 
the  consent  of  the  Delegates  of  the  Clarendon  Press,  grateful  acknowledgment 
being  made  also  to  the  family  of  the  late  author.  The  footnotes  of  Haigh  have 
been  omitted  as  of  no  immediate  value  here. — Editor.] 

[2  Compare  what  Milton  says  of  the  relation  between  the  habit  of  utterance 
and  the  national  character  (letter  to  Bonmattei,  quoted  by  Lord  Morley, 
Studies  in  Literature,  pp.  223-224) :  'Whoever  in  a  state  knows  how  wisely  to 
form  the  manners  of  men,  and  to  rule  them  at  home  and  in  war  with  excellent 
institutes,  him  in  the  first  place,  above  others,  I  should  esteem  worthy  of  all 
honor.  But  next  to  him  the  man  who  strives  to  establish  in  maxims  and  rules 
the  method  and  habit  of  speaking  and  writing  received  from  a  good  age  of  the 
nation,  and,  as  it  were,  to  fortify  the  same  round  with  a  kind  of  wall,  the 
daring  to  overleap  which  let  a  law  only  short  of  that  of  Romulus  be  used  to 
prevent.  .  .  .  The  one,  as  I  believe,  supplies  noble  courage  and  intrepid 
counsels  against  an  enemy  invading  the  territory.  The  other  takes  to  himself 
the  task  of  extirpating  and  defeating,  by  means  of  a  learned  detective  police 


78  A.  E.  HAIGH 

found  in  modern  theatres.  It  is  common  enough  at  the  present  day 
to  hear  blank  verse  declaimed  as  if  it  were  prose.  But  among  the 
ancient  Greeks  the  feeling  for  correctness  of  rhythm  in  poetical 
recitations  was  just  as  instinctive  as  is  the  feeling  for  correctness 
of  tune  among  ordinary  musical  audiences  at  the  present  time. 
If  an  actor  in  a  Greek  theatre  made  a  slip  in  the  metre  of  his  verses, 
it  was  regarded  in  much  the  same  way  as  a  note  out  of  tune  would 
be  regarded  in  a  modern  concert-room.  .  .  . 

The  theatre  of  Dionysus  at  Athens,  during  the  period  of  the 
Lenaea  and  the  City  Dionysia,  presented  a  spectacle  which  for 
interest  and  significance  has  few  parallels  in  the  ancient  or  the 
modern  world.  The  city  kept  universal  holiday.  The  various  pro- 
ceedings were  in  reality  so  many  religious  celebrations.  But  there 
was  nothing  of  an  austere  character  about  the  worship  of  Dio- 
nysus. To  give  freedom  from  care  was  his  special  attribute,  and 
the  sincerest  mode  of  paying  homage  to  his  power  was  by  a  genial 
enjoyment  of  the  various  pleasures  of  life.  At  this  time  of  univer- 
sal merriment  the  dramatic  performances  formed  the  principal 
attraction.  Each  day  soon  after  sunrise  the  great  majority  of  the 
citizens  made  their  way  to  the  southern  slopes  of  the  Acropolis, 
where  the  theatre  of  Dionysus  was  situated.  The  tiers  of  seats 
rising  up  the  side  of  the  hill  were  speedily  filled  with  a  crowd  of 
nearly  twenty  thousand  persons.  The  sight  of  such  a  vast  multitude 
of  people,  gathered  together  at  daybreak  in  the  huge  open  amphi- 
theatre, and  dressed  for  the  most  part  in  white,  or  in  red,  brown, 
yellow,  and  other  rich  colors,  must  have  been  exceedingly  striking 
and  picturesque.  The  performances  which  brought  them  together 
were  not  unworthy  of  the  occasion.  The  plays  exhibited  at  the 
festivals  of  Dionysus  rank  among  the  very  noblest  achievements  of 
Greek  genius.  For  beauty  of  form,  depth  of  meaning,  and  poetical 
inspiration  they  have  never  been  surpassed.    It  would  be  difficult  to 

of  ears,  and  a  light  band  of  good  authors,  that  barbarism  which  makes  large 
inroads  upon  the  minds  of  men,  and  is  a  destructive  intestine  enemy  of  genius. 
Nor  is  it  to  be  considered  of  small  consequence  what  language,  pure  or  corrupt,  a 
people  has,  or  what  is  their  customary  degree  of  propriety  in  speaking  it.  .  .  . 
For,  let  the  words  of  a  country  be  in  part  unhandsome  and  offensive  in  them- 
selves, in  part  debased  by  wear  and  wrongly  uttered;  and  what  do  they  declare 
but,  by  no  light  indication,  that  the  inhabitants  of  that  country  are  an  indo- 
lent, idly-yawning  race,  with  minds  already  long  prepared  for  any  amount  of 
servility?  On  the  other  hand,  we  have  never  heard  that  any  empire,  any 
state,  did  not  at  least  flourish  in  a  middling  degree  as  long  as  its  own  liking  and 
care  for  its  language  lasted.' — Editor.] 


THE  ATTIC  AUDIENCE  79 

point  to  any  similar  example  of  the  whole  population  of  a  city  meet- 
ing together  each  year  to  enjoy  works  of  the  highest  artistic  beauty. 
It  is  seldom  that  art  and  poetry  have  penetrated  so  deeply  into  the 
life  of  the  ordinary  citizens.  Our  curiosity  is  naturally  excited  in 
regard  to  the  tone  and  composition  of  the  audiences  before  which  a 
drama  of  such  an  exceptional  character  was  exhibited.  .  .  . 

At  the  Lenaea,  which  was  held  in  the  winter,  when  traveling  was 
difficult,  the  audience  consisted  almost  exclusively  of  natives  of 
Athens.  The  City  Dionysia  came  about  two  months  later,  at  the 
commencement  of  the  spring,  and  attracted  great  crowds  of 
strangers  from  various  parts  of  Greece.  Representatives  from  the 
allied  states  came  to  pay  the  annual  tribute  at  this  season  of  the 
year.  It  was  also  a  favorite  time  for  the  arrival  of  ambassadors 
from  foreign  cities;  and  it  was  considered  a  mere  matter  of  polite- 
ness to  provide  them  with  front  seats  in  the  theatre,  if  they  hap- 
pened to  be  in  Athens  during  the  celebration  of  the  City  Dionysia. 
In  addition  to  these  visitors  of  a  representative  character,  there 
were  also  great  numbers  of  private  individuals,  attracted  to  Athens 
from  all  parts  of  Greece  by  the  magnificence  of  the  festival,  and  the 
fame  of  the  dramatic  exhibitions.  Altogether  the  visitors  formed 
a  considerable  portion  of  the  audience  at  the  City  Dionysia.  One 
of  the  great  aggravations  of  the  offense  of  Midias  was  that  his 
assault  upon  Demosthenes  was  committed  in  the  presence  of  'large 
multitudes  of  strangers.'  Apparently  the  natives  of  foreign  states 
were  not  allowed  to  purchase  tickets  for  the  theatre  in  their  own 
name,  but  had  to  get  them  through  an  Athenian  citizen. 

The  composition  of  the  purely  Athenian  part  of  the  audience  is 
a  subject  upon  which  a  great  deal  has  been  written,  the  principal 
difficulty  being  the  question  as  to  the  admittance  of  boys  and  women 
to  the  dramatic  performances.  In  the  treatment  of  this  matter 
scholars  appear  to  have  been  unduly  biased  by  a  preconceived 
opinion  as  to  what  was  right  and  proper.  Undoubtedly  Athenian 
women  were  kept  in  a  state  of  almost  Oriental  seclusion.  And  the 
old  Attic  comedy  was  pervaded  by  a  coarseness  which  seems  to  make 
it  utterly  unfit  for  boys  and  women.  For  these  reasons  some  writ- 
ers have  gone  so  far  as  to  assert  that  they  were  never  present  at 
any  dramatic  performances  whatsoever.  Others,  while  not  exclud- 
ing them  from  tragedy,  have  declared  that  it  was  an  impossibility 
that  they  should  have  been  present  at  the  performances  of  comedy. 
But  the  attempt  to  draw  a  distinction  between  tragedy  and  comedy, 
in  regard  to  the  admission  of  boys  and  women  to  the  theatre,  will 


80  A.  E.  HAIGH 

not  bear  examination.  If  they  were  present  at  one,  they  must  have 
been  present  at  both.  The  tragic  and  the  comic  competitions  fre- 
quently took  place  upon  the  same  days,  and  succeeded  one  another 
without  any  interval;  and  it  is  difficult  to  suppose  that,  after  the 
tragedies  were  over,  a  large  part  of  the  audience  had  to  be  turned 
out  before  the  comedies  could  begin.  Moreover,  if  women  and  boys 
had  been  present  at  the  tragedies,  they  would  of  necessity  have  been 
spectators  of  the  satyric  dramas,  which  were  nearly  as  coarse  as 
the  comedies.  It  is  useless  therefore  to  endeavor  to  separate  tragedy 
from  comedy  in  the  consideration  of  this  question. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  evidence  upon  the  subject,  if  considered 
without  prejudice,  makes  it  practically  certain  that  there  were  no 
restrictions  of  the  kind  suggested.  The  audience  at  the  dramatic 
performances,  whether  tragic  or  comic,  was  drawn  from  every  class 
of  the  population.  Men,  women,  boys,  and  slaves  were  all  allowed 
to  be  present.  The  evidence  from  ancient  authors  is  too  copious  to 
be  accounted  for  on  any  other  supposition.  .  .  .3 

The  Athenians  were  a  lively  audience,  and  gave  expression  to 
their  feelings  in  the  most  unmistakable  manner.  The  noise  and 
uproar  produced  by  an  excited  crowd  of  twenty  thousand  persons 
must  have  been  of  a  deafening  character,  and  is  described  in  the 
most  uncomplimentary  language  by  Plato.  It  was  exceedingly  dif- 
ficult for  the  judges  to  resist  such  demonstrations,  and  to  vote  in 
accordance  with  their  own  private  judgment.  The  ordinary  modes 
of  signifying  pleasure  or  disgust  were  much  the  same  in  ancient  as 
in  modern  times,  and  consisted  of  hisses  and  groans  on  the  one  hand, 
and  shouts  and  clapping  of  hands  on  the  other.  The  Athenians  had 
also  a  peculiar  way  of  marking  their  disapproval  of  a  performance 
by  kicking  with  the  heels  of  their  sandals  against  the  front  of  the 
stone  benches  on  which  they  were  sitting.  Stones  were  occasionally 
thrown  by  an  irate  audience.  Aeschines  was  hissed  off  the  stage, 
and  '  almost  stoned  to  death, '  in  the  course  of  his  theatrical  career. 
There  is  an  allusion  to  the  practice  in  the  story  of  the  second-rate 
musician,  who  borrowed  a  supply  of  stone  from  a  friend  in  order 
to  build  a  house,  and  promised  to  repay  him  with  the  stones  he 
collected  from  his  next  performance  in  public.  Country  audiences 
in  the  Attic  demes  used  figs  and  olives,  and  similar  missiles,  for 
pelting  unpopular  actors.     On  the  other  hand,  encores  were  not 

[3  B.  B.  Rogers  forcibly  argues  against  the  assumption  that  women  attended 
performances  of  the  Old  Comedy.  See  his  edition  of  the  Ecclesiazusae  of  Aris- 
tophanes, Introd.,  pp.  xxix-xxxv. — Editor.] 


THE  ATTIC  AUDIENCE  81 

unknown,  if  particular  passages  took  the  fancy  of  the  audience. 
Socrates  is  said  to  have  encored  the  first  three  lines  of  the  Orestes 
of  Euripides. 

If  the  Athenians  were  dissatisfied  with  an  actor  or  a  play,  they 
had  no  hesitation  about  revealing  the  fact,  but  promptly  put  a  stop 
to  the  performance  by  means  of  hisses  and  groans  and  stamping 
with  the  heels.  They  were  able  to  do  so  with  greater  readiness,  as 
several  plays  were  always  performed  in  succession,  and  they  could 
call  for  the  next  play,  without  bringing  the  entertainment  to  a 
close.  In  this  way  they  sometimes  got  through  the  program  very 
rapidly.  There  is  an  instance  of  such  an  occurrence  in  the  story  of 
the  comic  actor  Hermon,  whose  play  should  naturally  have  come  on 
late  in  the  day ;  but,  as  all  the  previous  performers  were  promptly 
hissed  off  the  stage,  one  after  another,  he  was  called  upon  much 
sooner  than  he  expected,  and  in  consequence  was  not  ready  to 
appear.  If  the  tale  about  the  comic  poet  Diphilus  is  true,  it  would 
seem  that  even  the  authors  of  very  unsuccessful  plays  were  some- 
times forcibly  ejected  from  the  theatre. 

A  few  scattered  notices  and  descriptions,  referring  to  the  spec- 
tators in  the  Athenian  theatre,  show  that  human  nature  was  very 
much  the  same  in  ancient  times  as  at  the  present  day.  Certain 
types  of  character,  which  were  generally  to  be  met  with  among  an 
Attic  audience,  will  easily  be  recognized  as  familiar  figures.  There 
was  the  man  of  taste,  who  prided  himself  upon  his  superior  dis- 
cernment, and  used  to  hiss  when  every  one  else  was  applauding, 
and  clap  when  every  one  else  was  silent.  There  was  the  person  who 
made  himself  objectionable  to  his  neighbors  by  whistling  an  accom- 
paniment to  tunes  which  happened  to  please  him.  There  were  the 
1  young  men  of  the  town, '  who  took  a  malign  pleasure  in  hissing  a 
play  off  the  stage.  There  were  the  people  who  brought  out  their 
provisions  during  the  less  exciting  parts  of  the  entertainment. 
There  was  the  somnolent  individual  who  slept  peacefully  through 
tragedies  and  comedies,  and  was  not  even  waked  up  by  the  noise  of 
the  audience  going  away.  Certain  indications  show  that  the 
employment  of  the  claque  was  not  unknown  to  Greek  actors  and 
poets.  The  parasite  Philaporus,  who  had  recently  taken  up  the 
profession  of  an  actor,  and  was  anxious  about  the  result  of  his  first 
public  appearance,  writes  to  a  friend  to  ask  him  to  come  with  a 
large  body  of  supporters,  and  drown  with  their  applause  the  hisses 
of  the  critical  part  of  the  audience.  Philemon,  in  spite  of  his  infe- 
rior talents  as  a  comic  writer,  is  said  to  have  frequently  won 
victories  from  Menander  by  practices  of  this  kind. 


82  A.  E.  HAIGH 

The  character  of  the  Athenian  audience  as  a  whole  is  well  exem- 
plified by  the  stories  of  their  treatment  of  individual  poets.  Al- 
though they  were  willing  to  tolerate  the  utmost  ribaldry  upon  the 
stage,  and  to  allow  the  gods  and  sacred  legends  to  be  burlesqued 
in  the  most  ridiculous  fashion,  they  were  at  the  same  time  extremely 
orthodox  in  regard  to  the  national  religion.  Any  atheistical  senti- 
ments, and  any  violations  of  their  religious  law,  were  liable  to  pro- 
voke an  outburst  of  the  greatest  violence.  Aeschylus  on  one  occa- 
sion was  nearly  killed  in  the  theatre  itself,  because  he  was  supposed 
to  have  revealed  part  of  the  mysteries  in  the  course  of  a  tragedy. 
He  was  only  saved  by  flying  for  refuge  to  the  altar  of  Dionysus  in 
the  orchestra.  Euripides  also  caused  a  great  uproar  by  beginning 
his  Melanippe  with  the  line:  'Zeus,  whoever  Zeus  be,  for  I  know  not 
save  by  report,'  etc.  In  a  subsequent  production  of  a  revised 
version  of  the  play  he  altered  the  line  to :  '  Zeus,  as  is  reported  by 
truth,'  etc.  In  the  same  way  sentiments  which  violated  the  moral 
feeling  of  the  audience  were  received  with  intense  indignation,  and 
sometimes  resulted  in  the  stoppage  of  the  play.  The  Danae  of 
Euripides  is  said  to  have  been  nearly  hissed  off  the  stage  because 
of  a  passage  in  praise  of  money.  On  the  other  hand,  wise  and  noble 
sentiments  excited  great  enthusiasm.  Aristophanes  was  rewarded 
with  a  chaplet  from  the  sacred  olive  because  of  the  splendid  passage 
in  which  he  counsels  mercy  to  the  disfranchised  citizens.  Sopho- 
cles is  said  to  have  been  appointed  one  of  the  generals  in  the  Samian 
expedition  on  account  of  the  excellent  political  wisdom  shown  in 
certain  passages  of  the  Antigone.  The  partiality  of  the  Athenians 
for  idealism  in  art  is  shown  by  the  reception  which  they  gave 
to  Phrynichus'  tragedy  of  the  Capture  of  Miletus,  an  historical 
drama  in  which  the  misfortunes  of  the  Ionians  were  forcibly  por- 
trayed. So  far  from  admiring  the  skill  of  the  poet,  they  fined  him 
a  thousand  drachmas  for  reminding  them  of  the  miseries  of  their 
kinsfolk,  and  passed  a  law  forbidding  the  reproduction  of  this 
particular  play.    s*  . 

The  enthusiasm  of  the  Athenians  for  the  drama  was  unbounded. 
Nowhere  was  the  theatre  more  crowded.  In  the  words  of  one  of 
the  old  historians,  they  '  spent  the  public  revenues  on  their  festivals, 
were  more  familiar  with  the  stage  than  with  the  camp,  and  paid 
more  regard  to  verse-makers  than  to  generals.'  The  speeches  of 
Demosthenes  are  full  of  complaints  in  the  same  strain.  The  eager- 
ness with  which  dramatic  victories  were  coveted,  and  the  elaborate 
monuments  erected  to  commemorate  them,  have  already  been  re- 
ferred to.  .  .  .    It  was  not,  however,  till  the  middle  of  the  fourth 


THE  ATTIC  AUDIENCE  83 

century  that  the  devotion  to  this  and  similar  amusements  grew  to 
such  a  height  as  to  become  a  positive  vice,  and  to  sap  the  military 
energies  of  the  people.  The  Athenians  of  the  fifth  century  showed 
that  enthusiasm  for  art  and  music  and  the  drama  was  not  incon- 
sistent with  energy  of  character.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  very 
greatest  period  of  the  Attic  drama  is  also  the  period  of  the  political 
supremacy  of  Athens. 

As  far  as  intelligence  and  discrimination  are  concerned,  the 
Athenian  audiences  were  probably  superior  to  any  audience  of  the 
same  size  which  has  ever  been  brought  together.  Their  keen  and 
rapid  intellect  was  a  subject  of  frequent  praise  among  the  ancients, 
and  was  ascribed  to  the  exhilarating  influence  of  the  Attic  climate. 
They  were  especially  distinguished  for  the  refinement  of  their  taste 
in  matters  of  art  and  literature,  and  for  the  soberness  of  judg- 
ment with  which  they  rejected  any  sort  of  florid  exuberance.  That 
they  were  keenly  alive  to  the  attractions  of  beauty  of  form  and 
chastened  simplicity  of  style  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  Sophocles 
was  by  far  the  most  successful  of  their  tragic  poets.  Though  Eurip- 
ides became  more  popular  among  the  later  Greeks,  Sophocles  in 
his  own  lifetime  obtained  far  more  victories  than  any  other  tragic 
writer.  At  the  same  time,  it  is  easy  to  form  an  exaggerated  idea 
of  the  refinement  of  an  Attic  audience.  They  were  drawn  from  all 
classes  of  the  people,  and  a  large  proportion  were  ignorant  and  un- 
cultured. Plato  speaks  in  the  most  disparaging  terms  of  them,  and 
charges  them  with  having  corrupted  the  dramatic  poets,  and 
brought  them  down  to  their  own  level.  His  evidence  is  perhaps 
rather  prejudiced.  But  Aristotle,  who  had  much  greater  faith  in 
popular  judgment,  is  not  very  complimentary.  He  divides  the 
theatrical  audience  into  two  classes,  the  refined  and  cultured  class 
on  the  one  hand,  and  the  mass  of  rough  and  ignorant  artisans  on 
the  other.  One  of  his  objections  to  the  profession  of  an  actor  or 
musician  is  that  he  must  accommodate  himself  to  the  level  of  the 
ignorant  part  of  his  audience.  He  mentions  examples  in  the  Poetics 
of  the  low  level  of  popular  taste,  from  which  it  appears  that  the 
average  spectator  in  ancient  times  was,  like  his  modern  counterpart, 
fond  of  'happy  terminations.'  He  cared  little  for  the  artistic 
requirements  of  the  composition ;  his  desire  was  to  see  virtue  re- 
warded, and  vice  punished,  at  the  end  of  a  play.  Then  again,  a 
large  part  of  the  audience,  Aristotle  remarks,  were  so  ignorant  as 
to  be  unacquainted  with  the  ordinary  facts  of  mythology,  which 
formed  the  basis  of  most  tragedies.    In  judging  a  play,  they  paid 


84  A.  E.  HAIGH 

more  regard  to  the  actor's  voice  than  to  the  poet's  genius.  At  the 
same  time,  in  spite  of  depreciatory  criticisms,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  the  true  criterion  of  a  people 's  taste  is  to  be  found  in  the 
character  of  the  popular  favorites.  The  victorious  career  of  Sopho- 
cles, lasting  over  more  than  fifty  years,  is  a  convincing  proof  of  the 
fact  that,  at  any  rate  during  the  fifth  century,  the  dramatic  taste 
of  the  Athenians  was  altogether  higher  than  that  of  an  ordinary 
popular  audience. 


VIII 

THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  x 

By  Maurice  Croiset 

If  we  wish  to  trace  the  intellectual  and  moral  evolution  of  a 
people  in  the  history  of  its  literature,  it  would  seem  indispensable 
to  determine  first  of  all,  as  precisely  as  may  be,  its  original  point 
of  departure.  What  was  the  people,  before  it  so  much  as  had  a 
literature?  What  elemental  and  distinctive  qualities  did  it  pos- 
sess within  itself  during  those  times  of  ignorance  and  childlike 
simplicity,  when,  from  afar,  and  unconsciously,  it  was  preparing 
for  its  great  achievements  to  come  ?  To  what  degree  of  perfection 
had  these  qualities  advanced  when  it  saw  fit  to  turn  them  to  account 
in  its  first  poetical  productions? 

These  questions  naturally  suggest  themselves  to  us.  But  with 
respect  to  Greece  we  lack  the  documents  that  would  give  us  satis- 
factory answers.  Before  there  was  a  nation  that  could  properly  be 
called  Hellenic,  the  ethnic  elements  which  were  one  day  to  con- 
stitute it  had  each  a  separate  existence;  then,  by  a  series  of  com- 
binations which  still  remain  obscure,  they  were  gathered  into 
groups,  or  superimposed  one  upon  another.  Even  the  names  of 
these  primitive  stocks  are  imperfectly  known  to  us;  and,  in  spite 
of  the  daily  disclosures  of  archaeology,  the  glimpses  we  catch  of 
the  state  of  their  morals  and  the  characteristics  of  their  civilization 
amount  to  very  little.  We  discern  these  pre-Hellenic  races  of  Asia 
Minor  and  the  islands  through  a  sort  of  haze ;  the  Pelasgians  scat-  ^. 
tered  here  and  there,  the  Danai,  and  the  Achaeans,  whose  name  s 
reappears  on  ancient  Egyptian  monuments.  Their  temples,  their 
tombs,  and  their  fortresses  have  been  partially  restored  for  us  by 
the  unceasing  research  of  scholars.  One  may  assemble  and  study 
the  more  or  less  rude  products  of  the  industry  of  these  early  people, 

[i  This  extract  is  translated  from  the  Histoire  de  la  Littirature  Grecque 
(1.  1-19)  of  Alfred  and  Maurice  Croiset  (Paris,  1896);  and  the  translation  is 
published  by  an  arrangement  with  Fontemoing  &  Cie.,  of  Paris.  Of  the  admi- 
rable French  work,  in  five  volumes,  it  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that,  on  the 
whole,  it  is  the  best  history  of  any  literature  in  any  language. — Editor.] 


86  MAURICE  CROISET 

and  examine  the  objects  that  were  for  them  works  of  art,  in  an 
attempt  to  discover  some  indication  of  their  taste,  of  their  mental 
culture,  and  of  the  foreign  influences  they  underwent.  Such  inves- 
tigations are  full  of  interest  and  of  promise,  but  as  yet  they  have 
been  carried  only  a  little  way.  Not  until  that  day  when  science 
can  demonstrate  with  certainty  the  order  in  which  these  races  or 
these  tribal  groups  followed  each  other,  and  can  distinguish  the 
peculiar  characteristics  of  each  of  these  prehistoric  societies,  will 
the  history  of  Greek  literature  be  in  possession  of  its  real  starting- 
point.  Then  we  shall  be  able  to  see  the  Greek  genius  come  into 
being  and  grow,  to  enumerate  the  essential  elements  of  which  it 
is  composed,  and  to  comprehend  what  it  owes  to  its  remote  origins, 
to  foreign  influences,  to  the  mingling  of  races,  and  to  its  own  vigor. 
It  is  thus  that  modern  peoples  are  studied ;  let  us  hope  that  in  a  not 
distant  future  Greece  may  be  known  and  described  in  the  same 
way.  For  the  present,  an  application  of  this  method  would  be  too 
conjectural.  We  should  bewilder  our  readers  with  prolonged  dis- 
cussions, or  involve  them  in  pure  hypothesis;  and  they  would  be 
little  aided  in  their  understanding  of  the  subject  we  are  about  to 
consider  with  them. 

Let  us  therefore  defer  these  hopes,  and  content  ourselves  with 
briefly  setting  forth  such  things  as  are  certain.  Whatever  the 
manner  of  its  formation,  we  know  that  the  Greek  genius  had  taken 
shape  before  the  birth  of  the  Iliad.  Let  us  try  to  represent  it  for 
ourselves  here  in  its  most  essential  and,  consequently,  most  primi- 
tive features,  and  let  us  ignore  the  subsidiary  traits,  which  revealed 
themselves  only  at  certain  times  and  under  special  conditions. 

The  first  thing  that  strikes  one  in  the  Hellenic  race  is  the  variety 
of  its  talents.  The  old  Roman,  Juvenal,  bitterly  assailed,  by  the 
mouth  of  Umbricius,  the  versatility  of  the  Greeks  of  the  decadence 
who  overran  Rome,  and  deemed  themselves  fit  for  any  occupation.2 
Though  it  must  not  be  taken  too  seriously,  this  sally  of  a  satirical 
poet  in  a  fit  of  anger  undeniably  contains  an  element  of  truth. 
What  the  Roman  ridiculed,  so  serious  an  observer  as  Thucydides 
admired  in  the  Athenians  of  his  day;3  and  in  versatility,  as  in 

2  Juvenal,  Satires  3.  73  ff. : 

Ingenium  velox,  audacia  perdita,  sermo 

Promptus  et  Isaeo  torrentior.    Ede  quid  ilium 

Esse  putes;  quemvis  hominem  secum  adtulit  ad  nos: 

Grammaticus,  rhetor,  geometres,  pietor,  aliptes, 

Augur,  schoenobates,  medicus,  magus:  omnia  novit 

Graeculus  eeuriens;  in  caelum,  jusseris,  ibit. 
»  Thucydides  2.  41. 1. 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  87 

many  other  qualities,  the  Athenians  were  the  most  Greek  of  all 
Greeks.  Aristotle,  in  his  turn,  pointed  out  that,  generally  consid- 
ered, the  Europeans,  dwelling  in  the  cold  countries,  had  energy, 
but  were  wanting  in  swift  intelligence;  the  Asiatics,  on  the  con- 
trary, dwelling  in  the  warm  countries,  had  a  swift  intelligence,  but 
lacked  energy;  whereas  the  Greeks,  thanks  to  their  temperate 
climate,  combined  energy  of  character  with  intelligence.*  This 
even  development  of  diverse  faculties  brought  about  that  happy 
balance  and  harmony  which  mark  the  great  literary  as  well  as  the 
great  artistic  works  of  Greece.  The  Hellene  always  possessed  judg- 
ment in  imagination,  intellect  in  sentiment,  reflection  in  passion. 
One  never  sees  him  entirely  carried  away  in  one  direction.  He  has, 
so  to  speak,  a  number  of  faculties  ready  for  every  undertaking, 
and  it  is  by  a  combination  of  these  that  he  gives  to  his  creations 
their  true  character. 

For  the  same  reason,  too,  he  is  in  contact,  in  a  thousand  ways  at 
once,  with  nature  and  with  his  fellows.  Stolid  and  sluggish  races, 
at  least  in  their  beginnings  and  before  they  become  educated,  are 
capable  of  only  a  limited  number  of  unvarying  impressions,  which 
give  to  their  ideas  a  certain  solidity.  They  think  little,  they 
imagine  little;  their  thoughts  are  firmly  fixed,  and  their  concep- 
tions seem  to  be  inflexible.  The  Greeks,  an  alert  and  active  race, 
are  altogether  different.  Innumerable  impressions  are  constantly 
taking  shape  in  their  minds.  Nature  speaks  to  them  an  infinitely 
varied  language,  always  heard,  and  ever  new.  They  are  interested 
not  only  in  her  great  phenomena,  but  also  in  her  changing  aspects, 
in  the  delicate  and  fleeting  phases  of  her  endless  life.  And  this  is 
not  the  special  privilege  of  the  Ionian  of  Asia  Minor,  or  of  the 
dweller  in  Attica;  it  is  not  even  exclusively  that  of  the  seaboard 
people,  who  combine  the  life  of  the  fisherman  or  the  merchant  with 
that  of  the  husbandman.  The  Boeotian  or  Locrian  laborer,  as  we  see 
him  in  the  Works  and  Days  of  Hesiod — he  who  toils  heavily  in  the 
district  of  Ascra,  'cold  in  winter  and  scorching  in  summer' — even 
he  has  impressions  of  astonishing  vividness,  and,  as  it  were,  a  thou- 
sand visions  so  light  and  transparent  that  the  gaiety  or  sadness  of 
the  things  shines  through  them.  The  cry  of  the  birds  of  passage, 
the  strident  note  of  the  cicada,  the  blossoming  of  the  thistle,  all 
these  familiar  little  things  touch  him  like  the  communications, 
at  once  mysterious  and  clear,  of  so  many  neighboring  spirits.  And 
this  is  the  reason  why  all  the  Greeks  everywhere  peopled  the  earth 
with  gods  who  are  neither  mere  names  nor  unknown  powers,  but 

*  Aristotle,  Politics  7.  7. 


V 


88  MAURICE  CROISET 

living  and  almost  familiar  beings.  And,  in  thus  transforming 
nature,  they  did  no  more  than  return  to  her  what  she  had  given 
to  them.  The  life  of  the  external  world  had  come  to  them  full  of 
images  and  sensations;  it  departed  again  from  them  and  reverted 
to  external  objects,  full  of  gods. 

And  if  the  spectacle  of  the  world  thus  moved,  enchanted,  and 
taught  them,  that  of  humanity  did  not  profit  them  less.  The  Greek 
is  eminently  sociable.  He  joyfully  seeks  out  his  fellow  because  he 
has  much  to  give  him  and  much  to  receive  from  him,  and  because 
this  exchange  is  one  of  his  keenest  pleasures.  Hesiod,  whom  we  are 
fond  of  quoting  as  the  earliest  source  of  information  on  the  life  of 
the  people,  bids  the  industrious  peasant  pass  by  the  forge  and  the 
lesche  without  stopping.  It  is  there  that  people  hold  long  conversa- 
tions in  winter,  and  he  knows  how  strong  is  the  temptation  to 
enter.  He  does  not  fear  for  his  laborer  gross  allurements  such  as 
wine  and  debauchery ;  he  fears  those  which  one  might  call  delicate, 
those  of  the  spirit  rather  than  the  flesh.  The  Hellenic  mind,  in 
general,  is  too  open,  too  approachable  from  all  sides,  to  shut  itself 
up  in  a  dark  and  dominating  passion ;  and  hence  comes  that  great 
and  precocious  experience  of  life  which  is  already  obvious  in  the 
most  ancient  epic  poems.  In  them  man  shows  himself  full  of  con- 
trasts, with  unexpected  shades  of  feeling  and  distinctions  in  ideas, 
with  reverses  of  passion  which  are  wonderful ;  in  them  he  conforms 
to  every  role,  and  adapts  himself  to  all  situations;  he  is  master  or 
subject,  conquered  or  in  revolt;  he  is  father,  husband,  son,  friend, 
or  enemy,  each  and  all,  not  only  with  truth  and  propriety,  but  with 
great  variation.  Never,  perhaps,  in  any  other  people,  has  the  play 
of  human  faculties  been  so  free,  so  ready,  so  wide  in  scope. 

Without  doubt  it  is  to  this  that  we  must  attribute  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  qualities  of  the  Greeks,  the  lively  and  inexhaustible 
curiosity  which  manifests  itself  in  so  many  ways  in  everything  that 
race  has  created.5  In  the  natural  or  moral  sciences,  in  history,  in 
geography,  in  philosophy,  and  in  mathematics,  the  Greeks  were, 
in  the  best  sense  of  the  word,  inquisitive ;  and,  because  of  that,  they 
were  the  first  to  propound  almost  all  the  great  questions  and  to 
inaugurate  almost  all  good  methods.  An  enigma,  under  whatever 
form  it  was  presented,  always  tempted  them,  and,  above  all,  the 
enigma  of  the  universe.  Always  and  everywhere  they  wished  to  see 
and  to  know.  This  craving  to  question  everything  that  could  give 
an  answer  comes  to  light  in  the  first  natural  philosophers  of  Ionia. 

5  Plato,  Republic  4.  435  E :  rb  <pi\o/j.a$di,  8  Si}  vtpl  rbv  trap'  tjiuv  /tdXio-r'  Iv  rty 
aiTt&ffaiTO  rbirov. 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  89 

It  is  revealed  with  wonderful  artlessness  and  dignity  throughout  the 
profoundly  Hellenic  work  of  Herodotus;  and  in  the  history  of  all 
the  sciences  it  remains  one  of  the  glories  of  the  Peripatetic  school, 
which  threw  open  so  many  avenues  to  research  and  bestowed  so 
much  honor  upon  learning.  In  poetry,  too,  this  bent  of  mind  shows 
itself  from  the  earliest  times.  Part  of  the  charm  in  the  Odyssey 
for  its  first  auditors  lay  in  its  disclosing  to  their  inquisitive  minds 
so  many  remote  and  unknown  things.  The  two  great  primitive 
poems  of  Greece  are,  in  a  sense,  two  revelations :  the  Iliad  displays 
the  depths  of  human  nature;  the  Odyssey  discloses  the  immensity 
of  the  world. 

From  the  literary  point  of  view  quite  as  much  as  from  the  moral, 
it  is  true,  grave  faults  were  connected  with  these  superior  qualities. 
A  facility  in  understanding  everything  and  in  lending  oneself  to 
everything  is  at  times  a  dangerous  privilege.  The  maxim  of 
Theognis6  is  well  known:  'Learn  to  imitate  the  polypus,  which 
takes  the  aspect  of  the  stone  to  which  it  clings;  sometimes  follow 
that  course,  and  sometimes  change  your  color;  wisdom  is  worth 
more  than  inflexible  rigidity'  (k/jcWwv  toi  0-0^117  yiyvtrax  arpoici-qs) . 
The  thought  had  already  been  expressed  in  an  old  epic  or  didactic 
poem,  in  which  the  hero  Amphiaraus  says  to  his  son  Amphilochus, 
at  the  moment  of  parting  from  him:  'Amphilochus,  my  child,  be 
guided  by  the  example  of  the  polypus,  and  contrive  to  accommo- 
date yourself  to  the  customs  of  those  people  to  whom  you  will  come ; 
now  under  one  aspect,  now  under  another,  show  yourself  like  the 
men  among  whom  you  will  live.'7  To  tell  the  truth,  this  piece  of 
advice  did  not  belong  to  any  particular  individual,  but  expressed 
one  of  the  tendencies  of  the  national  character.  The  supple  and 
cunning  Ulysses  was  one  of  the  chief  heroes  of  epic  poetry,  and 
Hermes  represented  the  same  type  among  the  gods.  Now  in  the 
history  of  literature,  the  dangerous  element  in  this  native  versatility 
will  show  itself  quite  as  clearly  as  the  advantageous.  The  race  will 
take  possession  of  art  with  remarkable  ease ;  it  will  turn  its  facility 
to  account  in  a  brilliant  way,  but  often  it  will  be  too  complacent 
in  the  exercise  of  its  faculties.  Cicero  tells  us  in  one  of  his  letters 
that  Posidonius  of  Rhodes  (one  of  the  most  weighty  of  the  philos- 
ophers), and  some  others,  whom  he  does  not  name,  wrote  to  him 
with  the  request  that  he  would  send  them  some  notes  concerning 
his  consulate,   promising  to  embellish   the   same   without   delay: 

•  Theognis  215-218  (Poetae  Lyrici  Graeci,  ed.  Bergk,  4th  ed.,  vol.  2). 
I  Athenaeus  7. 102.     See  the  commentary  of  Bergk  in  regard  to  the  passage 
just  quoted  from  Theognis. 


90  MAURICE  CROISET 

'Instabant  ut  darem  sibi  quod  ornarent.'8  No  doubt  one  may  see 
in  this  a  sign  of  the  decadence ;  yet  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that 
times  of  decadence  do  not  bring  to  light  in  the  character  of  a  race 
things  which  were  not  latent  there.  As  reported  by  Thucydides,9 
Cleon  had  long  since  reproached  the  Athenians  with  being  'spec- 
tators of  words  and  auditors  of  actions' ;  that  is  to  say,  with  regard- 
ing the  oratorical  contests  at  the  tribune  as  a  spectacle,  and  histori- 
cal events  as  an  affecting  drama.  And  there  we  have  the  natural 
defect  of  the  most  Hellenic  quality.  When  a  people  is  in  posses- 
sion of  faculties  so  ready  and  so  diverse,  the  danger  lies  in  making 
use  of  them  after  the  manner  of  a  virtuoso  instead  of  adapting  them 
seriously  to  the  work  of  human  life. 

And  now,  if,  in  addition  to  this  general  aptitude,  we  try  to  single 
out  more  precisely  some  of  the  qualities  of  mind,  of  imagination, 
or  of  feeling,  in  the  Greeks,  our  principal  observations  are  the 
following. 

The  Hellenic  race  is  essentially  keen  of  intellect.10  '  From  ancient 
times,'  says  Herodotus,  'the  Hellene  has  been  distinguished  from 
the  barbarian  because  he  is  more  wary  and  more  free  from  foolish 
credulity.'11  This  is  true  neither  of  one  particular  period  nor  of 
one  special  group  of  individuals.  Intellectual  acuteness  may  be 
observed  in  the  oldest  epic  poets  as  well  as  in  the  great  tragic 
writers  of  the  fifth  century,  and  as  far  down  as  the  sophists  of  the 
decadence.  And  in  the  very  life  of  the  nation  it  is  as  evident  as  in 
the  literature.  It  finds  its  way  into  the  social  life,  where  it  main- 
tains and  excites  a  taste  for  ridicule,  for  discussion,  for  anecdote, 
for  fable,  for  the  neatly  turned  sentence;  it  seeks  and  discovers 
an  outlet  in  affairs,  notably  in  finance  and  commerce;  finally,  it 
dominates  political  life ;  for  not  only  in  Athens,  but  in  every  town 
of  Greece,  wherever  the  light  of  history  penetrates,  we  see  men 
who  manipulate  their  interests  with  acumen. 

In  this  connection  we  must  not  allow  ourselves  to  be  deceived  by 
certain  bits  of  ancient  testimony  which  have  been  too  quickly 
accepted,  and  which  need  some  explanation.  Often,  and  not  with- 
out reason,  one  hears  the  gravity  of  the  Dorian  nature  contrasted 
with  the  delicate  subtlety  of  the  Ionian ;  a  jest  is  still  made,  upon 
the  authority  of  one  of  Aesop's  fables,  on  the  simplicity  of  the 

s  Cicero,  Ad  Atticum  2. 1. 
»  Thucydides  3.  38. 4. 

io  Ingeniorum  acumen — Cicero,  Pro  Flacco  4. 

11  Herodotus  1.60:  '  AireKpidr]  4k  iraXatWpov  rov  fiappdpov  tdvcos  rb  'E\\r)viic6t>  ibv 
Kcd  de^itirepop  ical  tfajddTjs  ijkidlov  iirrjWaypJyov  pLaWov. 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  91 

Greeks  of  Cyme;  and  the  dulness  of  the  Boeotians  is  proverbial. 
Here  we  are  dealing  either  with  relative  truths  greatly  exaggerated, 
or  with  silly  taunts  maliciously  spread  abroad.  People  with  keen, 
and  consequently  satirical,  wits  naturally  are  the  most  prone  to 
disparage  themselves  in  that  way  as  a  result  of  certain  local  dif- 
ferences in  customs  or  language.  One  must  guard  against  believing 
these  things  when  they  are  merely  asserted.  Not  to  mention  here 
the  great  names  in  literature  and  politics  of  Boeotia,  no  one  to-day 
could  be  persuaded  that  the  unknown  artists  who  unpretentiously 
shaped  the  beautiful  little  figures  of  Tanagra  were  boors  or  block- 
heads. And  it  would  be  a  singular  mistake  to  conceive  of  the 
Dorian  gravity  as  a  sort  of  mental  ponderousness  incompatible 
with  delicacy.  The  witty  sayings  of  the  Spartans  were  justly 
famous  throughout  Greece;  we  still  possess  an  ample  collection  of 
them  in  the  moral  writings  of  Plutarch.12  Less  graceful  and  less 
delicately  ironical  than  those  of  the  Athenians,  they  are  more  con- 
cise and  vigorous.  Several  wise  men,  famous  for  their  maxims, 
belonged  to  the  Dorian  section  of  Greece;  and  when  Cicero  in  his 
De  Oratore  wished  to  teach  the  method  of  pointing  those  clever 
expressions  which  furnish  eloquence  with  a  weapon,  he  sought 
examples  from  all  the  Greeks  without  distinction  of  tribe.  '  I  have 
found  among  the  Greeks,'  he  says,  'a  multitude  of  witty  sayings. 
The  Sicilians  excel  in  this  sort  of  thing,  and  also  the  Rhodians  and 
Byzantines,  but  above  all  the  Athenians.'13  The  Sicilian  Greeks, 
in  general,  seem  to  him  'a  nation  acute  and  able  in  discussion' 
(Acuta  ilia  gens  et  controversa  natura).1*  'A  Sicilian,'  he  says, 
'is  never  in  so  bad  a  plight  that  he  cannot  find  some  witty  thing 
to  say.'15  Moreover,  in  order  to  realize  how  truly  Hellenic  is  the 
quality  of  which  we  have  been  speaking,  it  is  only  necessary  to 
contrast  the  native  genius  of  Greece  with  that  of  an  alien  people, 
as,  for  example,  that  of  Rome.  The  Roman  mind  is  wise  and  power- 
ful, naturally  judicious  and  precise ;  but  not  even  its  very  precision 
has  the  acuteness  of  the  Greek  mind.  Though  for  that  reason  more 
safe  from  the  bold  fascinations  of  logic  and  the  subtle  refinements 
of  argument,  how  dearly  does  the  Roman  pay  in  his  corresponding 
lack  of  penetration ! 

It  is  due  to  this  keenness  of  mind  that  the  Greeks  were  so  early 

12  Plutarch,  Apophthegmata  Laconica  and  Lacaenarum  Apophthegmata. 
is  Cicero,  De  Oratore  54. 
i*  Cicero,  Brutus  12. 

is  Cicero,  In   Verrem  2. 43 :    Nunquam  tam  male  est   Siculis,  quin   aliquid 
f  acete  et  commode  dicant. 


92  MAURICE  CROISET 

and  so  long  masters  in  moral  analysis  as  well  as  in  the  art  of 
reasoning.  It  is  through  this,  too,  that  they  so  easily  turned  soph- 
ists during  certain  periods  of  their  history,  and  that  there  was 
often  an  element  of  excessive  ingenuity  in  their  greatest  writers. 
It  was  always  easier  for  them  than  for  others  to  make  nice  vital 
distinctions  in  ideas,  and  to  perceive  and  bring  to  light  the  least 
obvious  aspects  of  things;  but  they  had  always  some  difficulty  in 
refraining  from  the  discussion  of  what  was  unworthy  of  discus- 
sion, and  from  searching  out  what  was  not  worth  the  search. 

As  they  thought  with  penetration,  so  they  executed  with  clear- 
ness. The  Greeks  were  a  people  of  imagination,  but  they  shared 
that  quality  with  many  other  races.  It  certainly  is  safe  to  believe 
that  in  the  head  of  a  Hindu,  a  Scandinavian,  or  a  German,  there 
have  generally  been  as  many  images,  and  images  as  strong  and 
lively,  as  in  the  head  of  a  Greek.  But  the  peculiarity  in  the  latter 's 
manner  of  conceiving  is  that  all  the  images  which  he  carried  within 
his  mind,  and  which  were  constantly  renewed,  presented  simple 
forms  and  settled  outlines.  Nothing  that  was  vague,  obscure, 
indefinable,  had  any  place  there,  so  to  speak.  All  things  were,  if  not 
equally,  at  least  adequately,  clarified.  One  might  properly  say 
that  it  was  never  night  in  the  imagination  of  a  Greek.  And  since 
measureless  things  are  necessarily  in  some  part  obscure,  it  is  only 
natural  that  every  Greek  conception  was  measured.  Not  that  mod- 
eration in  all  things  was,  much  as  it  has  at  times  been  asserted,  an 
essential  trait  of  the  Greek  genius.  In  their  philosophical  specu- 
lation, as  well  as  in  their  political  life,  the  Greeks  lacked  it  often 
enough.  But  in  works  of  the  imagination  they  preserved  it  with- 
out effort.  If  this  faculty  more  than  any  other  in  man  is  under 
the  direct  influence  of  the  senses,  it  would  seem  that  the  habit  of 
living  beneath  a  sky  frequently  clear,  and  of  having  before  one's 
eyes  horizons  almost  always  sharply  defined,  might  be  regarded  as 
the  primary  cause  of  this  truly  national  characteristic.  Never 
from  his  infancy  accustomed  in  looking  about  him  to  encounter 
either  infinity  or  vagueness,  the  Greek  put  neither  into  the  mental 
images  which  he  formed.16     The  world  of  his  recollections,   his 

i«  The  beautiful  lines  in  Euripides'  Medea  [828-830]  in  regard  to  the  Athe- 
nians are  familiar:  $epf$6fievoi  KXeivordrav  aocplav,  del  Sid  XapirpoTdrov  fSalvovres 
d/3pws  al04pos,  k.  t.  e.  Cicero,  De  Nat.  Deor.  2.16:  'Etenim  licet  videre 
acutiora  ingenia  et  ad  intelligendum  aptiora  eorum  qui  terras  incolant  eas  in 
quibus  aer  sit  purus  ac  tenuis,  quam  illorum  qui  utantur  crasso  caelo  atque 
concreto. ' — E.  Keclus,  Nouvelle  GSogr.  Univ.,  Europe  MSridionale,  p.  59:  'In 
the  country  about  the  gulfs  of  Athens  and  Argos,  it  is  not  only  the  blue  of 
the  sea,  the  infinite  smile  of  the  waves,  the  transparency  of  the  sky,  the  reced- 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  93 

fictions,  and  his  fancies,  naturally  resembled  the  world  of  reality 
which  he  saw  about  him. 

Nothing  is  more  instructive  in  this  respect  than  his  mythology. 
Since  it  belongs  to  all  the  Greek  tribes  simultaneously  and  during 
the  earliest  period  of  their  history,  it  serves  especially  well  to  show 
the  turn  of  imagination  which  from  the  most  distant  times  pre- 
vailed throughout  the  race.  Now  is  it  not  remarkable  to  observe 
how  the  great  natural  phenomena  which  are  the  basis  of  their  fables 
immediately  took  on  distinct  and  simple  forms,  restrained  alike  in 
feature  and  outline?  The  greater  number  of  the  gods  appear  as 
human  beings.  If  perchance  any  element  of  indefiniteness  is  to  be 
found  in  them  at  their  origin,  poetry  instinctively  strives  to  elimi- 
nate it.  They  are  represented  as  surrounded  with  light.  Far  from 
remaining  half  plunged  in  the  unknown  and  mysterious,  they 
emerge  fully  to  offer  themselves  in  their  sensible  beauty  to  the 
minds  of  those  who  have  faith.  And  even  when  their  original 
nature  least  lends  itself  to  such  transformation,  it  is,  just  as  far 
as  possible,  forced  upon  them.  When  the  Greek  imagination  per- 
sonifies the  lightning  and  the  thunder,  tempests,  whirlpools,  and 
volcanic  eruptions,  that  is  to  say,  immense  and  unbridled  forces, 
it  simplifies  and  limits  them  as  much  as  it  can.  In  Greek  mythology 
one  finds  absolutely  nothing  analogous  to  the  immense  and  fantastic 
conceptions  of  India,  or  to  the  dark  dreams  of  the  Scandinavians. 
The  Cyclopes,  the  Hecatonchires,  Aegeon  and  Briareus,  Typhoeus 
and  the  Titans,  in  their  struggle  against  the  Olympians,  certainly 
offer  the  closest  resemblance  to  them;  but  it  is  evident  that  Greek 
poetry,  when  it  represents  these,  does  everything  in  its  power,  short 
of  being  too  unfaithful  to  their  original  creative  idea,  to  render 
them  easy  to  conceive ;  and  it  must  be  added  that  as  a  general  rule 
Greek  poetry,  far  from  delighting  in  such  images,  on  the  contrary 
more  and  more  neglected  them.  The  gods  whom  the  poets  most 
loved  were  the  most  human. 

This  plastic  distinctness  of  conception  is  one  of  the  most  attrac- 
tive qualities  of  Hellenic  literature.  For  the  Greeks,  everything 
in  the  realm  of  imagination  is  clear,  everything  open  to  the  senses ; 
and  as  these  pure  forms  are  in  addition  full  of  vitality,  so  they  con- 
tain something  that  charms  us  intensely  and  gives  us  satisfaction. 
These  qualities,  however,  necessarily  exclude  others,  or  at  least  re- 

ing  stretches  of  the  shores,  and  the  bold  relief  of  the  promontories,  that  entrance 
the  artist;  it  is,  likewise,  the  pure,  sharp  outline  of  the  mountains  with  their 
strata  of  limestone  or  marble.  One  thinks  of  them  as  great  architectural  piles, 
and  many  of  the  temples  that  crown  them  seem  only  to  repeat  the  design. ' 


94  MAURICE  CROISET 

strict  them.  The  obscure,  as  well  as  the  luminous,  has  its  poetry, 
and  what  a  man  fancies  he  dimly  descries  through  shadows  is 
often  the  thing  that  most  deeply  stirs  him.  Perhaps  the  Romans 
had  more  of  this  sense  of  the  invisible  and  intangible  than  the 
Greeks.  In  Lucretius  and  Virgil  we  may  discover  profound  lines 
that  make  us  feel  what  we  cannot  see,  and  open  to  the  imagination 
mysterious  distances  full  of  illusion  or  terror: 

Impiaque  aeternam  timuerunt  saecula  noctem.17 

And  yet  the  Romans  were  not  by  nature  poets  of  the  mysterious. 
This  wonderful  faculty  of  dreaming  outside  the  realm  of  precise 
forms,  and  of  feeling  what  lies  beyond  definite  and  limited  sensa- 
tions, we  find  far  more  in  the  poems  of  India;  and  the  Germanic 
and  Scandinavian  races  have  communicated  more  or  less  of  it  to 
almost  all  modern  peoples.18  Among  the  Greeks,  on  the  contrary, 
the  faculty  is  relatively  weak.  But,  to  compensate,  their  distinct- 
ness of  conception  follows  them  into  the  field  of  abstractions — and 
there,  too,  it  has  its  advantages  as  well  as  inconveniences.  No 
people  has  given  to  metaphysics  a  greater  measure  of  concrete  real- 
ity. Not  only  do  the  philosopher-poets  of  the  earliest  times  make 
for  themselves  a  mythology  which  they  substitute  for  the  popular 
one,  but,  in  the  full  supremacy  of  prose,  the  disciples  of  Socrates 
do  precisely  the  same  thing.  Plato  creates  for  himself  a  world  of 
gods  with  his  Ideas ;  he  sees  them  reelothed  in  marvelous  forms,  and 
he  describes  them  to  us.  Thus  the  most  unsubstantial  generaliza- 
tions become  animated;  they  take  on  a  physiognomy,  so  to  speak, 
and  are  rendered  familiar.  Assuredly  there  is  pleasure  in  this — 
but  is  there  no  danger  to  science  and  sound  reason?  The  Greeks 
alone  put  into  the  world  more  metaphysical  entities  than  all  other 
peoples  together.  How  many  of  these  phantoms  there  are  which 
have  the  air  of  being  something,  and  are  nothing!  You  may  say, 
if  you  like,  that  their  intellectual  keenness  and  curiosity  are  chiefly 
at  fault;  but  has  not  their  method  of  invention  also  been  in  large 
measure  responsible? 

In  the  study  of  Greek  literature,  moreover,  it  is  necessary  to 
take  serious  account  of  a  trait  of  character  which  is  not  simple, 
but  is  the  result  of  nearly  all  the  special  qualities  already  described. 

[17  Virgil,  Georgics  1.  468. — Editor.] 

is  Victor  Hugo,  Feuilles  d'Automne  31: 

For  the  soul  of  the  poet,  a  soul  of  shadow  and  love, 
Is  a  flower  of  the  night,  which  opens  when  day  is  done, 
And  unfolds  itself  to  the  stars. 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  95 

Although  tradition  is  very  powerful  in  Greek  literature,  individual 
liberty  everywhere  shines  forth.  The  same  subjects  are  handed 
down  through  many  generations  of  poets,  but  almost  never  are  the 
newcomers  enslaved  by  the  authority  of  their  predecessors.  If 
they  readily  accept  the  given  models,  they  also  accept  them  in  the 
right  way ;  for  example  does  not  in  any  fashion  cramp  them.  They 
have  a  way  of  employing  these  models  which  is  their  own,  and 
which  implies  nothing  that  could  be  called  slavishness.  The  use  of 
old  subjects,  and  even  of  established  forms,  is  for  them  like  the  use 
of  language ;  every  one  avails  himself  of  it  without  a  thought  that 
he  is  thereby  imitating  any  one  else.  Above  all,  one  scarcely  en- 
counters in  Greek  literature  those  dominant  influences  which, 
among  almost  all  peoples,  have  more  or  less  permanently  substituted 
a  conventional  moral  truth  for  the  truth  of  nature.  The  Roman 
usually  possesses  a  certain  senatorial  or  consular  dignity  which  he 
exhibits  in  all  that  he  writes.  He  assumes  a  part  suited  to  the  lofti- 
ness of  his  worldly  position,  and  utters  only  the  sentiments  that 
are  in  accord  with  it.  One  might  inscribe  at  the  beginning  of  a 
history  of  Latin  literature : 

Tu  regere  imperio  populos,  Bomane,  memento.19 

In  all  our  modern  literatures,  without  exception,  the  same  circum- 
stance reappears.  The  Middle  Ages  are  mystical,  chivalrous,  and 
scholastic.  The  sixteenth  century  is  erudite  and  at  times  pedantic. 
The  seventeenth,  be  it  in  France,  in  England,  or  in  Spain,  expe- 
rienced the  vogue  of  refined  gallantry,  of  pretty  wit,  and  often  of 
Castilian  punctiliousness.  The  greatest  geniuses  themselves,  Shake- 
speare, Calderon,  Corneille,  were  more  or  less  subject  to  these  con- 
ventions. But  in  Greece  it  is  difficult,  down  to  the  Alexandrian 
age,  to  point  out  anything  analogous.  And  even  in  the  decadence, 
when  the  Hellenic  genius  was  no  longer  so  clearly  conscious  either 
of  its  power  or  its  originality,  how  this  innate  independence  on 
occasion  once  more  flashes  out!  In  contrast  with  Pliny  and  Taci- 
tus, both  of  them  so  completely  Roman,  there  stands  Plutarch,  with 
his  fine  and  charming  Hellenic  spirit,  so  natural  and  human  under 
the  slightly  mannered  forms  which  his  time  imposed  upon  him. 
Finally,  when  a  Syrian  like  Lucian  has,  by  his  entire  education  and 
reading  and  mode  of  life,  rendered  himself  Greek,  what  freedom 
he  finds  in  the  Hellenism  which  has  become  second  nature  to  him ! 
The  Greeks,  in  fact,  were  constantly  nearer  than  any  other  people 
to  the  simple  human  truth.  It  was  they  who  most  rarely  lost  sight 
[19  Virgil,  Aeneid  6.  851. — Editor.] 


96  MAURICE  CROISET 

of  it,  and  who  always  most  easily  found  it  again.  By  his  bold- 
ness of  judgment,  by  the  whim  of  his  imagination,  by  the  naive  or 
reflective  sincerity  of  his  feelings,  the  Greek  escapes  everything 
that  might  curb  the  swing  of  his  nature.80  Nothing  artificial  is 
superimposed  upon  the  pure  humanity  in  him.  The  special  char- 
acteristics which  this  humanity  takes  on  in  his  works  are  those  of 
which  he  could  not  divest  himself,  since  he  actually  carries  them 
within  his  being.  They  appertain  neither  to  one  accepted  role  nor 
to  any  discipline  whatsoever. 

In  conclusion,  we  must  say  something  of  what  one  might  call 
the  predominant  moral  characteristic  of  the  Hellenic  race,  since  in 
point  of  fact  nothing  is  of  greater  importance  for  its  literary  his- 
tory. On  this  matter  differences  of  opinion  that  are  worth  con- 
sidering have  appeared  among  eminent  critics.  For  some,  care- 
lessness and  gaiety  are  at  the  foundation  of  the  Hellenic  character. 
'The  Greeks,'  says  M.  Renan,  'children  that  they  were,  took  life 
so  merrily  that  it  never  occurred  to  them  to  curse  the  gods,  or  to 
find  nature  unjust  and  treacherous  to  man.'21  And  in  another 
place  the  same  writer  tells  us  of  'the  eternal  youth  and  gaiety 
which  have  always  characterized  the  true  Hellene,  and  which  to- 
day still  make  the  Greek  a  stranger  to  the  heavy  cares  that  prey 
upon  us.'22  On  the  other  hand,  the  author  of  Le  Sentiment  Reli- 
gieux  en  Grece,  M.  Jules  Girard,  who  has  so  profound  a  sym- 
pathy with  the  Greek  spirit,  takes  an  altogether  contrary  view. 
'  In  reality  there  was  in  the  Greek, '  he  says,  '  an  anxiety  about  him- 
self, about  his  condition,  and  about  his  destiny,  which  awoke  at  the 
same  time  as  his  brilliant  imagination,  and  which  put  into  his 
first  works,  no  matter  how  vigorous  they  might  otherwise  be,  a 
note  of  melancholy,  the  pathetic  force  of  which  has  never  been 
surpassed  by  anything  in  the  writings  of  the  moderns.'23  No  one 
can  seriously  disregard  the  measure  of  truth  in  this  last  opinion. 
But  if  it  emphatically  expresses  the  result  of  an  erudite  and  care- 
ful examination,  the  first  opinion  sums  up  in  broad  outline,  and 
with  an  exaggeration  undoubtedly  intended,  a  general  impression 
which,  in  spite  of  the  necessary  corrections,  remains  on  the  whole 
accurate.  Surely  the  Greeks  had  too  keen  an  intelligence,  and  too 
much  freedom  of  judgment,  to  fail  in  perceiving  very  early  all  that 

20  This  explains  the  great  personal  originality  of  some  of  the  distinguished 
men  of  Greece.  There  is  no  Socrates  or  Diogenes  to  be  found  in  Eome.  Com- 
pared with  them,  Cato  the  Censor  seems  stiff  and  formal. 

21  Renan,  Les  Apotres,  p.  328. 

22  Ibid.,  p.  339.    Cf .  E.  Eeclus,  op.  tit.,  p.  64. 

23  Girard,  Le  Sentiment  Beligieux  en  Grece,  2nd  ed.,  Paris,  1879,  p.  6. 


THE  GREEK  RACE  AND  ITS  GENIUS  97 

there  is  of  darkness  in  man's  condition,  and  of  injustice  and  pain 
sometimes  in  the  march  of  events.  And  it  was  at  the  same  time 
impossible  that  their  quick  sensibilities  should  be  exempt  from 
suffering  over  the  calamities  of  life.  But  if  the  question  is  one 
of  determining  the  moral  characteristic  that  predominated  in  them, 
and  that  is  most  often  observable  in  their  literature,  it  seems  very 
evident  that  this  is  not  finally  to  be  identified  with  the  mournful 
conception  of  things  to  which  the  moderns  have  frequently  given 
expression,  and  which  shows  itself  also  in  certain  Latin  authors. 
In  a  moment  of  affliction  or  revolt,  they  might  doubtless  have 
exclaimed  with  Theognis:  'The  best  thing  for  a  man  is  not  to  be 
born,  never  to  see  the  shining  light  of  the  sun ;  once  born,  the  best 
thing  is  to  break  through  the  gates  of  Hades  as  soon  as  possible, 
and  to  lie  down  in  the  tomb,  heaping  earth  upon  his  head.'24  But 
it  is  a  long  way  from  chance  lamentations,  which  now  and  then 
escape  from  the  least  melancholy  natures,  to  a  gloomy  habit  of 
thought  and  feeling.  All  the  poetry  of  the  Greeks  is,  in  a  word, 
the  poetry  of  life.  Their  constant  ideal  is  an  ideal  of  youth  and 
beauty,  which  they  ceaselessly  strive  to  realize,  and  upon  which 
they  love  to  fix  their  thoughts.  The  great  cause  of  habitual  sad- 
ness— that  is  to  say,  a  profound  sense  of  the  constant  disproportion 
between  what  we  conceive  and  what  we  accomplish,  between  what 
we  desire  and  what  we  obtain — this  inward  cause  of  the  modern 
lament,  the  Greeks  scarcely  knew.  Certain  thinkers  among  them 
may  have  had  some  notion  of  it,  but  the  Greek  race,  in  its  entirety, 
delighting  in  its  own  thoughts  and  feelings,  and  prompted  by 
nature  to  an  ever  active  optimism,  has  been,  more  than  any  other, 
a  friend  to  life.25 

Such,  in  its  general  traits,  is  the  Hellenic  type  as  we  conceive  it. 
The  history  of  Greek  literature,  when  viewed  from  above  and  as 
a  whole,  is  simply  a  development  of  these  fundamental  observations. 

2*  Theognis  425-428,  Bergk. 

23  Aristotle  (Problems  30. 1)  asks  himself  why  it  is  commonly  true  that  men 
who  are  superior  in  philosophy,  politics,  poetry,  or  the  arts,  are  melancholy. 
Doubtless  his  observation  chiefly  concerned  the  Greeks;  yet  it  was  not  confined 
to  them.  If  it  is  quite  correct — and  that  may  be  doubted, — the  conclusion 
drawn  from  it  should  simply  be  that  the  great  men  of  Greece  did  not  wholly 
escape  a  natural  law;  but  one  must  be  careful  not  to  regard  melancholy  as  a 
trait  of  the  national  character. 


IX 

THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY1 

By  August  Boeckh 

It  is  obviously  hard  to  define  the  general  character  of  an  age  or 
a  nation,  and  indeed  almost  impossible  to  represent  it  in  precise 
concepts;  for  the  intuitive  grasp  of  the  whole,  that  clearly  is  de- 
manded, can  hardly  be  given  in  such  terms.  But  as  science  can  work 
only  with  definite  terms,  our  sole  resource  is,  through  these,  to 
stimulate  an  appreciation  of  the  whole,  approaching  it  from  various 
sides.  First  of  all,  then,  we  must  discover  the  appropriate  concepts ; 
and  as  consistency  forbids  our  abandoning  the  philological  stand- 
point, we  may  not  borrow  them,  say,  from  the  philosophy  of  history ; 
rather,  this  last  should  acquire  them  by  the  philological  method,  so 
as  not  to  lose  itself  in  empty  formulas  and  fancies.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  philosophers  often  stretch  and  strain  the  facts  to  suit  pre- 
conceived notions  and  fit  into  a  system,  this  does  not  warrant  us  in 
following  certain  philologists  who  deem  all  historical  speculation 
useless — the  needful  thing  is  the  rigorous  grounding  of  speculation 
in  fact.  But  again,  nothing  is  more  faulty  than  the  attempt  to 
characterize  a  race  or  a  period  directly  from  individual  facts.  The 
procedure  will  generally  result  in  a  one-sided  and  biased  estimate; 
for,  the  motion  of  life  being  free,  the  spirit  of  the  whole  and  of  the 

[i Professor  Gildersleeve  says  of  Boeckh  (Hellas  and  Hesperia,  p.  42) :  'His 
teaching  made  a  passionate  classicist  out  of  an  amateurish  student  of  literature. 
Boeckh  was  a  great  master,  the  greatest  living  master  of  Hellenic  studies,  and 
if  I  became  after  a  fashion  a  Hellenist,  it  was  due  not  merely  to  the  catalytic 
effect  of  his  presence,  but  to  the  orbed  completeness  of  the  ideal  he  evoked, 
and  though  the  fifty  odd  years  that  have  elapsed  since  I  sate  in  his  lecture- 
rooms  have  witnessed  the  elimination  of  many  of  the  results  of  his  studies,  the 
human  results  abide.'  No  results  of  Boeckh 's  activity  are  more  permanent 
than  his  Encyclopddie  und  Methodologie  der  Philologischen  Wissenschaften, 
a  posthumous  publication  containing  his  theory  of  literary  and  linguistic  schol- 
arship. Herein  is  evoked  his  ideal  in  its  'orbed  completeness.'  His  general 
characterization  of  antiquity  (Encyclopadie,  pp.  263-300)  has  not  been  sur- 
passed. The  translation  appears  with  the  consent  of  Messrs.  B.  G.  Teubner, 
Leipzig. — Editor.  ] 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  99 

general  does  not  find  uniform  expression  in  all  the  particulars. 
Thus  the  idea  of  cosmopolitanism  occurs  in  Socrates  and  the  Stoics, 
but  is  not  characteristic  of  antiquity;  it  anticipates  the  modern 
conception  of  life.  Again,  the  thought  expressed  by  Socrates  at 
the  end  of  the  Platonic  Symposium,  that  a  good  tragic  poet  will  be 
a  good  comic  poet,  too,  is  similarly  isolated  in  antiquity.  These 
examples  show  how  mistaken  is  the  attempt  to  derive  the  ruling 
ideas  of  antiquity  from  single  instances;  we  must  draw  our  infer- 
ences from  the  entire  body  of  facts.  And  the  sources  are  easily 
found.  One  should  try  to  comprehend  the  great  spheres  of  life  in 
their  proper  nature — the  State,  private  life,  art,  and  learning — 
each  for  itself,  and  each  in  relation  to  the  others.  The  characteristic 
element  will  in  every  case  be  found  by  an  induction  based  upon  all 
the  included  forms,  just  as  the  character  of  these  forms  will  be 
inferred  from  the  individual  phenomena.  Now  induction  is  never 
complete,  so  that  this  in  itself  makes  the  problem  only  approxi- 
mately soluble.  Furthermore,  the  particulars  themselves  can  be 
rightly  understood  only  in  the  light  of  a  general  survey  of  antiq- 
uity; thus  we  are  again  confronted  by  the  circle  inherent  in  the 
nature  of  philological  investigation,  a  circle  which  in  turn  can  be 
only  approximately  avoided.  In  characterizing  antiquity  we  can- 
not, of  course,  make  explicit  the  inductive  process  that  has  led  to 
each  several  thought. 

Now  it  might  not  in  general  seem  admissible  to  speak  so  sweep- 
ingly  and  without  distinction  of  a  character  of  antiquity,  when  this 
term  embraces  the  most  varied  nationalities.  In  the  ancient  Orient, 
in  so  far  as  it  is  historically  related  to  the  Occident,  we  find  highly 
civilized  peoples,  such  as  the  Indians,  Persians,  Babylonians,  Phoe- 
nicians, and  Jews.  To  these  must  be  added  the  Egyptians  and  Car- 
thaginians and  the  barbarians  of  the  West.  And  in  the  province  of 
classical  antiquity  itself,  as  the  term  is  commonly  used,  we  have 
to  reckon  with  the  difference  between  Greek  and  Roman.  How 
can  one  detect  a  common  character  in  this  variety?  But  a  closer 
inspection  tells  us  that  ancient  civilization  reached  its  high-water 
mark  in  Hellenism,  and  here  attained  to  classic  perfection.  Hellen- 
ism represents  the  real  character  of  antiquity,  which  in  essentials, 
though  stamped  with  a  definite  bias,  appears  again  among  the 
Romans.  To  gain  an  understanding  of  antiquity,  therefore,  we 
must  begin  with  the  culture  of  the  Greeks  as  a  basis.  On  the  one 
hand,  Greece  stands  opposed  to  the  Orient,  from  which  the  Greeks, 
like  the  rest  of  the  Indo-Germanic  peoples,  took  their  origin ;  there 
the  character  of  antiquity  did  not  come  to  full  development,  but 


100  AUGUST  BOECKH 

may  nevertheless  be  seen  in  the  germ.  On  the  other  hand,  we  have 
a  contrast  in  modern  civilization,  with  Roman  civilization  as  the 
intermediary  link.  .  .  . 

The  Greek  spirit,  like  spirit  in  general,  developed  gradually, 
and  when  we  go  back  to  the  earliest  times  of  which  we  have  any 
knowledge,  the  divergence  of  Greek  culture  from  Oriental  is  very 
slight.  In  the  first  period,  commonly  called  Pelasgic,  the  religion 
of  the  Hellenes — cult  as  well  as  myth, — and  also  their  communal 
and  family  life,  has  many  analogies  with  the  Orient.  At  this  point 
we  find  primitive  relations  containing  the  germ  of  all  possible  devel- 
opments; here  are  the  beginnings  of  what  is  human,  fettered  in 
nature  to  a  lower  form  of  consciousness  which  operates  almost  en- 
tirely as  an  instinct.  The  Greeks,  however,  achieved  their  free- 
dom from  the  shackles  of  nature,  while  the  pertinacious  and  inflex- 
ible Oriental  culture  remained  prisoner.  Nevertheless,  even  among 
the  Greeks  the  balance  in  the  intellectual  life  was  on  the  side  of 
nature,  and  not  until. modern  times  did  a  purely  spiritual  con- 
sciousness finally  become  predominant.  Accordingly,  the  most  gen- 
eral difference  between  ancient  and  modern  culture  is  this:  rela- 
tively speaking,  in  antiquity  it  is  nature  that  rules,  and  in  modern 
times,  spirit.  Nature  develops  according  to  necessary  laws;  while 
spirit,  though  subject  indeed  to  laws,  is  nevertheless  free.  The 
culture  of  antiquity,  then,  is  characterized  rather  by  necessity,  and 
that  of  modern  times  by  freedom.  In  comparison  with  the  Orient, 
to  be  sure,  the  Greeks  attained  a  high  degree  of  freedom ;  all  their 
culture  rests  upon  the  development  of  the  free  spirit  of  man.  But 
the  human  race  makes  its  escape  from  necessity  by  a  gradual 
process,  and  the  Greeks  succeeded  in  raising  themselves  only  to 
the  level  of  individual  freedom;  for  since  in  nature  everything  is 
individual,  and  the  realm  of  pure  spirit  is  the  universal,  the  culture 
of  antiquity  is  predominantly  individual,  while  modern  culture 
strives  after  universality.  But  the  peculiarity  of  the  Greeks  lies  in 
the  way  they  developed  human  nature  to  an  untrammeled  perfec- 
tion of  individuality,  apprehending  the  universal  only  in  so  far 
as  it  is  inseparable  from  individual  culture.  And  this  explains  the 
fact  that  in  every  realm  of  life  they  produced  a  great  variety  and 
multitude  of  distinct  forms ;  whereby,  indeed,  they  brought  to  per- 
fection that  culture  of  antiquity  based  upon  the  principle  of  nature. 
The  multiplying  tendency  is  inherent  in  nature,  since  there  every- 
thing separates  into  many  varied  shapes  and  forms;  whereas  the 
principle  of  unity  is  spirit,  and  hence  in  the  development  of  mod- 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  101 

ern  times  a  striving  after  unity  is  uppermost — the  universal  can 
be  brought  to  pass  only  when  the  parts  are  united.  To  the  con- 
trast between  multiplicity  and  unity  corresponds  another  that  has 
often  been  applied  to  the  relation  between  ancient  and  modern 
times,  namely  that  of  the  real  and  the  ideal.  Ancient  culture  as 
a  whole  is  more  realistic  than  modern,  for  in  antiquity  even  the 
most  ideal  aspirations  assume  a  realistic  form.  Analogous  is  the 
distinction  between  the  external  and  internal,  and  the  subjective 
and  objective.  The  natural  is  external,  objective;  and  the  purely 
spiritual,  internal,  subjective.  Among  the  ancients,  then,  even  the 
inmost  emotions  assume  an  external  shape ;  subjective  feeling  asserts 
itself  less  than  objective  perception  and  representation.  Herewith 
we  have  the  differences  between  ancient  and  modern  times  reduced 
to  seven  categories: 

Antiquity  Modern  Times 

/  Supremacy  of  Nature  Supremacy  of  Spirit 

\  Necessity  Freedom 

Individuality  Universality 

Desire  for  Multiplicity  Desire  for  Unity 

Realism  Idealism 

Externality  Inwardness 

Objectivity  Subjectivity 

By  applying  these  pairs  of  contrasted  concepts  to  the  several 
spheres  of  ancient  life,  we  may  present  a  general  view  of  antiquity, 
approaching  our  object  from  every  angle.  Yet  we  should  not  forget 
that  the  contrasted  ideas  are  not  mutually  exclusive,  and  that  in 
antiquity  particular  individuals  advanced  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
general  development,  while  modern  civilization,  on  the  other  hand, 
has  in  more  than  one  respect  fallen  behind,  or  indeed  on  occasion 
retrogressed. 

I.  On  its  first  appearance  in  the  Orient  the  State  seems  to  have 
been  wholly  under  the  dominion  of  nature,  being  formed  by  a  nat- 
ural artistic  instinct  in  man  (who  is  a  £<2ov  ttoXitikov  )  out  of 
the  family,  and  upon  the  model  of  the  family,  into  the  organized 
tribe.  Larger  kingdoms  arose  when  one  tribe  held  a  number  of 
others  together  by  force.  In  the  absence  of  any  free  and  conscious 
principle,  occupations  undertaken  by  the  individual  for  society 
were  handed  down  as  an  inheritance.  Thus  arose  castes — for  they 
were  no  invention  of  the  priesthood.  Among  the  early  Greeks  we 
find  similar  conditions.     There  each  state  originally  consisted  of 


102  AUGUST  BOECKH 

natural  stocks,  phratries,  and  families,  and  occupations  as  well  as 
political  functions  were  inherited.  Even  when  the  original  prin- 
ciple ceased  to  be  binding,  the  division  continued  in  existence ;  only 
it  was  now  modified  in  accordance  with  the  greater  freedom  of  the 
individual.  In  place  of  phylae  came  territorial  divisions;  but  the 
fiction  of  stocks  was  always  retained,  and  in  addition  the  State  was 
split  up  into  a  large  number  of  corporate  units.  This  tendency 
toward  particular,  separate,  individual  forms  may  also  be  seen  in 
the  fact  that  Greece  was  always  sundered  into  little  states.  The 
tendency  to  form  larger  states  is  modern,  though  it  has  its  begin- 
nings in  antiquity,  in  the  empires  of  Macedon  and  Rome.  But 
the  policy  of  Alexander  the  Great  oversteps  the  bounds  of  what  is 
characteristically  ancient;  and  the  great  Roman  state  differs  from 
modern  states  in  that  it  is  simply  the  wide  realm  of  the  one  city, 
Rome.  The  ancients  always  conceived  of  the  State  in  an  external 
and  plastic  fashion  as  a  city.  Thus  the  Roman  state  means  the 
civitas  Romana.  Similarly,  Athens  and  Sparta  never  concentrated 
the  might  of  Hellas  into  a  single  power;  they  merely  exercised 
dominion  over  other  states.  Of  course,  this  same  particularism  has 
in  the  modern  State  been  but  gradually  overcome.  As  it  caused 
the  downfall  of  Greece,  so  it  has  repeatedly  brought  Germany  to 
the  brink  of  ruin.  The  principle  of  individuality  in  the  ancient 
State  is  further  illustrated  by  the  fact  that  each  member  of  the 
State  represented  himself,  personally.  Representative  governments, 
where  an  individual  acts  for  the  community,  are  modern.  Among 
the  ancients,  assemblies  of  the  people  were  a  matter  of  necessity, 
taking  place  even  under  the  tyrants.  Indeed,  the  Greeks  in  the 
Persian  empire,  like  those  in  Ionia  and  Caria,  had  their  popular 
assemblies.  Now  this  would  seem  to  contradict  the  statement  that 
in  antiquity  necessity,  and  in  modern  life  freedom,  has  the  pre- 
dominance— there  would  seem  to  have  been  greater  political  free- 
dom in  ancient  times  than  we  have  in  modern.  "With  the  ancients, 
however,  freedom  rested  upon  the  recognition  of  all  individuals, 
and  hence  upon  the  predominance  of  individuality  and  multiplicity 
as  against  the  universal  and  unity.  And  it  had  its  limits.  Beyond 
the  circle  of  individual  culture  there  was  no  freedom,  so  that  a 
great  proportion  of  human  beings  were  not  free.  Slavery  is  a 
necessary  presupposition  of  ancient  life;  Aristotle,  in  fact, 
attempted  to  justify  it  upon  scientific  grounds.  Modern  slavery, 
on  the  other  hand,  runs  counter  to  the  spirit  of  the  modern  State. 
When  the  American  slaveholders  asserted  that  the  black  race  was 
designed  by  nature  for  the  service  of  the  whites,  their  contention 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  103 

was  precisely  the  same  as  that  of  the  Greeks  when  the  latter 
asserted  that  the  barbarians  were  born  to  serve  them;  save  that 
such  a  view  is  wholly  out  of  keeping  with  modern  times,  and  strikes 
us  as  inhuman  and  godless.  Furthermore,  in  antiquity,  though  the 
republican  form  of  government  prevailed,  nevertheless  the  State 
as  such,  and  similarly  the  individual  as  such,  were  less  free.  Indi- 
viduals counted  as  individuals  in  the  State,  which  was  represented 
by  all,  not  by  one  or  a  few ;  even  in  relation  to  the  State,  however, 
the  particular  individual  was  not  on  that  account  more  free;  nay 
rather,  he  entirely  lost  his  identity  therein.  "What  would  seem  to 
be  the  highest  degree  of  freedom  was  but  a  tyranny  of  the  people. 
In  principle  the  ancient  State  was  passionate,  hard,  despotic.  More- 
over, in  comparing  the  ancient  with  the  modern  State  one  must  take 
corresponding  forms  of  government.  An  ancient  republic  was,  of 
course,  more  free  than  a  modern  despotism,  but  it  was  less  free 
than  a  modern  republic.  In  origin,  the  republics  of  antiquity  were 
aristocratic ;  and,  judged  by  our  standards,  they  so  remain  even  in 
the  period  of  the  freest  democracy — as,  for  example,  in  Athens, 
where,  in  a  population  of  500,000  persons,  there  were  not  more  than 
21,000  enfranchised  citizens.  An  ancient  monarchy  was  either 
despotic  or  patriarchal,  for  constitutional  monarchy  was  not  devel- 
oped in  antiquity — there  existed  only  a  vague  conception  of  it  in 
the  mixed  form  of  government  composed  of  the  three  fundamental 
types,  and  this  form  almost  never  appeared.  When  the  modern 
State  has  reached  the  goal  of  its  development,  it  will,  irrespective 
of  its  form  of  constitution,  have  a  degree  of  freedom  far  in  advance 
of  anything  offered  by  antiquity ;  but  it  has  not  everywhere  reached 
its  goal,  whereas  antiquity  lies  before  us  in  its  entirety.  In  the  evo- 
lution of  government  the  freedom  of  the  ancient  State  appears 
simply  as  a  middle  term  between  Oriental  despotism  and  the  con- 
stitutional freedom  of  modern  nations.  Noteworthy,  too,  is  the 
circumstance  already  touched  upon,  that  throughout  antiquity  alle- 
giance to  a  particular  state  was  paramount.  A  man  was  fettered  to 
his  own  government,  and  few  struggled  through  into  cosmopolitan- 
ism. The  patriotism  of  the  ancients  was  rooted  in  a  life  wholly 
lived  in  the  actually  existing  State ;  whereas  modern  cosmopolitan- 
ism often  leads  to  false  theorizing  and  an  indifference  to  one's 
immediate  surroundings.  True  cosmopolitanism,  however,  in  no 
way  militates  against  patriotism,  but  rather  frees  it  from  the  nar- 
rowness and  bigotry  with  which  it  was  often  infected  among  the 
Greeks,  who  were  unable  to  conceive  of  the  State  even  in  terms  of 


104  AUGUST  BOECKH 

its  national   function — to   say  nothing   of   its  ideal   relation   to 
humanity. 

II.  Those  general  interests  of  mankind  which  the  State  is  de- 
signed to  realize,  false  cosmopolitanism  construes  subjectively ;  they 
are,  as  it  were,  made  a  private  concern,  and  the  State  then  easily 
appears  in  the  light  of  a  necessary  evil — as  an  instrument  of  com- 
pulsion for  the  security  of  private  life,  this  last  being  the  only  thing 
to  which  any  value  is  attached  in  and  for  itself.  In  antiquity,  on 
the  other  hand,  private  life  was  completely  merged  in  the  life  of 
the  State,  so  that  the  individual  seemed  to  exist  merely  for  the  sake 
of  the  State ;  for,  as  public  affairs  were  carried  on  in  a  wholly  indi- 
vidual manner,  and  as  state  interests  are  more  objective  than 
private,  in  the  prevailing  objectivity  of  ancient  times  the  particular 
man  found  his  satisfaction,  as  an  individual,  in  public  life.  The 
objective  side  of  private  life,  the  real  labor  and  burden  of  daily 
existence,  fell  to  those  whom  the  State  did  not  recognize  as  individ- 
uals— the  slaves  and  the  women.  The  free  citizen  was  the  despot  of 
the  home.  Consequently  all  domestic  and  social  intercourse  was 
marked  by  a  lack  of  freedom,  a  characteristic  especially  noticeable  in 
the  relations  between  the  sexes.  Man  did  not  recognize  woman  as  his 
equal,  and  her  position  was  more  subordinate  in  proportion  as  the 
political  freedom  of  the  citizen  became  greater.  In  warlike  states, 
during  the  frequent  absence  of  all  able-bodied  men,  independent 
management  of  the  household  devolved  upon  the  women ;  only  there 
did  they  enjoy  a  greater  measure  of  consideration.  In  Sparta  they 
were  almost  emancipated.  Absolute  intellectual  and  spiritual  equal- 
ity was  first  conceded  to  them  by  Plato;  but  not  until  the  advent 
of  Christianity  was  the  foundation  laid  of  that  reverence  for  woman 
which  since  the  Middle  Ages  has  put  the  relations  of  the  sexes  upon 
an  ever  higher  plane  of  freedom  and  nobility,  though  women  even 
now  have  not  fully  secured  their  release  from  an  unworthy  state 
of  dependence.  'Platonic'  love,  so-called, — that  is,  pure  spiritual 
love — is  not  ancient.  Plato  merely  sought  in  similar  fashion  to 
idealize  the  love  of  men  for  boys.  But  this  last  arose  from  the  fact 
that  in  social  intercourse  the  sexes  were  kept  apart,  the  result  being 
that  the  natural  attraction  of  the  adult  toward  blooming  adoles- 
cence succumbed  to  the  allurement  of  external  sense,  and  particu- 
larly to  the  sight  of  naked  figures  in  the  gymnastic  exercises.  In 
antiquity  sexual  love  is  dominated  by  the  senses.  Even  in  the  most 
beautiful  poetry  the  representation  of  love  lacks  the  higher  spiritual 
consecration — whereas  the  sentimental  love  of  modern  times  often 
wants  the  touch  of  nature.    The  ancients  regarded  marriage  in  its 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  105 

natural  aspect,  realistically,  as  instituted  for  the  ends  of  procrea- 
tion. The  marriage  contract  originally  was  limited  by  natural  rela- 
tionship ;  wedlock  occurred  only  between  members  of  related  clans. 
Here  again  we  observe  the  same  multiplicity  of  natural  groups  that 
showed  itself  in  the  life  of  the  State.  Later,  when  the  right  of 
intermarriage  between  the  citizens  of  different  states  existed,  it  still 
depended  upon  express  conventions.  That  the  free  consent  of  the 
bride  was  not  a  prerequisite  to  the  validity  of  the  contract  may  be 
gathered,  for  example,  from  the  Attic  laws  concerning  heiresses; 
by  virtue  of  his  descent,  the  nearest  relative  had  a  claim  to  the  hand 
of  an  heiress,  and  could  make  good  his  claim  before  the  law.  Under 
such  an  arrangement  the  wife  might  easily  appear  an  unwelcome 
addition  to  her  dower,  and  the  code  of  Solon  therefore  humanely 
sought  to  render  the  natural  ends  of  marriage  secure  by  providing 
that  the  husband  should  fulfil  his  conjugal  duties  at  least  three 
times  a  month.  Yet  it  must  not  be  thought  that  the  spiritual  bond 
was  wholly  lacking  in  the  family  life  of  antiquity.  The  feminine 
sex  was  by  no  means  despised,  and  in  the  Greek  house  the  apart- 
ment of  the  women  was  no  harem.  If  scattered  utterances  in 
ancient  writers — as,  for  example,  in  the  misogynist  Euripides — 
reduce  woman  to  a  mere  machine  for  child-bearing,  this  argues 
nothing  as  to  the  general  attitude  of  antiquity ;  in  not  a  few  modern 
authors  the  depreciation  of  woman  goes  still  farther.  Greek  poetry 
and  sculpture  presented  high  ideals  of  womanhood,  and  indeed  the 
rigorous  adherence  to  monogamy  evinces  the  respect  accorded  to 
the  personal  dignity  of  woman.  Upon  the  basis  of  the  natural 
appeal  to  the  senses  there  often  grew  up-  in  marriage  a  tender  con- 
jugal love,  while  the  great  reverence  of  children  for  parents  was 
remarkable.  Again,  the  Greek  cult  of  the  dead  bears  witness  to 
the  depth  and  permanence  of  their  fidelity  even  to  the  departed. 
Parental  love  found  its  characteristic  expression  in  the  manner  of 
educating  the  children,  which  eminently  well  illustrates  the  individ- 
ualizing tendency  of  the  Greek  spirit.  The  Greeks  introduced  the 
ideal  of  humanity  into  education.  Their  aim  was  to  fashion  every 
free  citizen  into  a  complete  man  by  the  harmonious  development  of 
his  spiritual  and  bodily  powers  through  artistic  training  and  gym- 
nastics. His  further  education  came  from  life  itself,  through  the 
public  nature  of  all  communal  affairs,  the  friendly  intercourse  of 
men  and  youths,  and  the  spectacle  of  the  rich  world  of  art  with 
which  the  daily  life  of  the  Greeks  was  surrounded.  Choice  of  occu- 
pation followed  individual  propensity,  and  every  one  could  become 
everything.    There  were  no  professional  castes.    But  whatever  he 


106  AUGUST  BOECKH 

chose  to  be,  each  strove  to  be  that  entirely.  Precisely  on  account  of 
their  general  human  culture,  the  ancients  were  dominated  by  an 
energetic  endeavor  to  excel  in  special  callings.  In  modern  times 
the  idea  of  general  human  culture  has  taken  on  a  wider  meaning. 
The  individual  is  to  be  formed  not  simply  into  a  man  as  such,  but 
at  the  same  time  into  a  useful  member  of  human  society,  an  end 
that  can  be  attained  only  through  instruction  of  every  sort.  Such 
instruction  is  therefore  the  principal  thing  in  modern  education, 
whereas  in  the  genuine  antiquity  of  Greece  emphasis  was  laid  upon 
cultivating  skill  in  the  arts  and  gymnastics.  Moreover,  instruction 
has  become  universal  in  two  senses.  First,  in  modern  times  the 
tendency  has  been  to  impart  it  to  all,  whereas  in  antiquity  slaves 
were  entirely,  and  women  for  the  most  part,  excluded.  And  sec- 
ondly, with  respect  to  subject-matter,  it  is  not,  as  with  the  Greeks, 
narrowly  national,  but  is  meant  to  introduce  the  individual  his- 
torically to  the  evolution  of  mankind ;  for  which  reason  a  knowledge 
of  ancient  and  modern  languages  is  deemed  a  part  of  general 
culture? 

III.  Greek  religion  apparently  grew  out  of  an  aboriginal  mono- 
theism belonging  to  the  same  stage  of  civilization  as  the  patriarchal 
monarchy,  though  supplanted  at  a  much  earlier  date.  Polytheism 
arose  among  all  the  nations  of  antiquity  as  a  result  of  nature- 
worship,  in  which  the  divine  power  was  apprehended  under  mani- 
fold natural  symbols,  contemplation  being  mainly  directed  to  the 
particular  and  real.  In  the  pre-Homeric  age  the  religion  of  nature 
was  transformed  by  priestly  minstrels  into  that  profound  mysticism 
which  we  also  note  in  the  religious  systems  of  the  Orient.  But  the 
result  was  not,  as  among  the  inhabitants  of  India  and  the  Jews,  a 
priestly  religion  set  down  in  writing.  With  the  Greeks,  it  is  true, 
the  priesthood  originally  descended  by  inheritance  within  families, 
yet  this  gave  rise  to  no  priestly  caste  and  no  hierarchy.  And  thus 
it  became  possible  for  the  entire  body  of  myth  to  be  metamorphosed 
through  epic  poetry ;  the  plastic  figures  of  the  divinities  created  by 
the  poets  represented  the  divine  nature  of  mankind  in  all  its  varied 
manifestations,  and  the  State  of  the  Homeric  gods,  the  serene  and 
free  world  of  Olympus,  was  an  ideal  image  of  the  individual  free- 
dom won  by  the  efforts  of  the  Greek  spirit.  But  the  gods  never 
ceased  to  be  divinities  of  nature.  All  nature  was  divided  up  among 
them,  and  was  under  their  dominion.  And  the  variety  and  color  of 
the  divine  world  were  further  diversified  by  the  individual  forms 
given  to  legend  and  cult  in  each  several  state.  Greek  religion  was 
not  concerned  with  instruction  in  spiritual  matters ;  it  was  poetical, 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  107 

and  adorned  with  all  the  radiance  and  charm  of  art — but  for  that 
very  reason  external  and  sensuous.    Religious  feeling  and  piety,  it 
is  true,  were  by  no  means  lacking  in  the  Hellenes;  but  their  devo- 
tion was  of  a  purely  practical  order.  Nor  was  it  moral  conduct  alone 
that  appeared  pleasing  to  the  gods.    The  most  external  and  sensuous 
activities  and  pleasures  of  life  were  linked  with  religious  concep- 
tions, so  that  sense  was  deified,  while  the  inner  religious  life  was 
quite  in  abeyance.    This  serves  to  explain  the  remarkable  fact  that 
the  age  of  the  Pisistratidae  witnessed  a  revival  of  the  old  mystical 
religion  which  had  lived  on  in  the  practice  of  soothsaying  and  in  the 
mysteries.    This  revival  was  prompted  by  a  craving  of  the  deeper 
emotions,  and  under  the  influence  of  philosophy  there  gradually 
developed  a  purer  form  of  religious  perception.    Thus  the  way  was 
prepared  for  Christianity.    But  with  Christianity  came  the  domi- 
nance of  an  entirely  new  principle ;  for  the  national  barriers  of  Jew- 
ish monotheism  were  broken  down,  and  the  Christian  Church  aimed 
at  the  founding  of  a  universal  religion  that  elevated  man  not  merely 
into  a  citizen  of  the  world,  but  into  a  citizen  of  the  kingdom  of 
heaven.    While  paganism  strove  to  reduce  spirit  to  terms  of  the 
senses,  Christianity  would  fain  make  the  sensuous  spiritual.    As  a 
religion  of  the  spirit,  it  must  needs  destroy  the  ancient  religion  of 
nature ;  but  in  establishing  itself  upon  the  ruins,  it  was  obliged  to 
incorporate  from  paganism  much  that  even  now  has  not  been  com- 
pletely eliminated.    So  in  the  Christian  form  of  worship  there  are 
many  outward  ceremonies  of  pagan  origin  which  give  the  divine  ser- 
vice a  sensuous  quality ;  and  the  polytheistic  elements  in  the  dogma 
are  likewise  pagan.    Now  this  runs  counter  to  the  true  nature  of 
Christianity,  which  transcends  all  ancient  religions  by  attaining  to 
an  ideal  monotheism  drawn  from  the  depths  of  the  human  heart.    In 
antiquity,  philosophy  alone  had  attained  thereto;  and  hence  the 
very  striking  utterance  of  Chrysostom — that  the  Cross  of  Christ 
had  turned  all  peasants  into  philosophers.    Here  lie  the  beginnings 
of  the  advance  of  modern  times  to  spiritual  freedom.    The  change 
may  be  seen  above  all  in  the  transformation  of  the  ancient  ideas 
as  to  the  relation  between  what  was  and  what  was  not  divine.    It 
was  the  fundamental  notion  of  antiquity  that  fate — the    tlfwpixevrj — 
necessarily  determined  everything,  even  the  will  of  the  gods.    Mod- 
ern religion,  on  the  other  hand,  rests  upon  the  belief  in  a  free  provi- 
dence, an  idea  found  in  antiquity  only  in  certain  philosophers. 
"When  we  penetrate  more  deeply,  of  course,  we  see  that  funda- 
mentally the  two  views  amount  to  the  same  thing,  since  in  God 
freedom  and  necessity  are  identical ;  but  the  form  of  apprehension 


108  AUGUST  BOECKH 

is  after  all  essentially  different.  Let  it  not  be  supposed,  however, 
that  with  the  Greeks  a  belief  in  the  law  of  necessity  as  governing 
every  occurrence  paralyzed  their  energy  of  action.  Their  individ- 
ual training  endued  them  with  a  lofty  self-confidence,  based  upon 
a  knowledge  of  their  own  power;  and  without  attempting  what 
lay  beyond  its  necessary  limitations,  they  made  this  power  count 
to  the  full. 

Since  ancient  art  sprang  from  religion,  the  two  had  essentially 
the  same  character.  The  art  of  antiquity  was  far  less  concerned 
than  that  of  to-day  with  the  inner  feelings,  but  it  had  more  of  the 
truth  of  nature.  This  is  the  distinction  Schiller  had  in  mind  when 
he  called  ancient  art  'naive'  and  modern  art  'sentimental' ;  though, 
indeed,  there  ran  through  the  old  nature-worship  a  strain  of  senti- 
ment that  found  expression  in  music  and  poetry.  And  yet  in  their 
very  sentimentality  the  Greeks  were  natural,  even  sensuous.  But 
the  special  quality  of  Greek  art  was  its  plastic  form.  All  their 
artistic  conceptions  were  presented  in  firm,  objective,  individually 
complete  figures,  which  reflected  the  world  of  actuality  in  an  ideal- 
ized image.  The  clear  apprehension  of  individual  forms  in  their 
distinct  multiplicity  enhanced  the  unity  of  each  work  of  art,  and 
this  very  simplicity  made  it  possible  to  attain  more  perfectly  and 
effectively  to  completeness  of  the  whole  and  harmony  of  all  the 
parts.  The  true  contrast  is  that  of  plastic  and  romantic;  for  it  is 
a  mistake  to  represent  romantic  as  the  opposite  of  classic.  The  term 
classic  should  be  applied  to  all  perfect  art  and  culture,  wherever 
found;  but  the  classic  art  of  modern  times — in  so  far  as  it  is  not 
modeled  after,  or  is  not  indirectly  influenced  by,  antiquity — is  pre- 
vailingly romantic,  its  aim  and  purpose  being  to  reveal  the  inner 
life  of  the  spirit.  The  unity  and  totality  it  strives  to  compass  are  of 
sentiment,  which  it  seeks  to  arouse  in  manifold  ways ;  and  hence  it 
operates  by  means  of  an  inclusive  universal  variety  that  often  runs 
into  profuseness.  The  harmony  of  the  parts  is  not  addressed  to 
the  senses;  it  is  ideal.  The  forms  which  this  art  derives  from  the 
world  of  reality  are  not  strictly  delimited,  but  are  freely  combined 
by  an  imagination  that  strives  toward  the  infinite;  and  so  their 
outlines  often  melt  away  into  a  nebulous  haze.  Since  the  plastic 
quality  is  normal  in  plastic  art  itself,  the  ancients  attained  supreme 
excellence  in  sculpture,  creating  unsurpassable  models  for  all  time. 
Ancient  painting,  on  the  other  hand,  lacked  the  romantic  perspec- 
tive. Everything  appeared  in  direct,  tangible  proximity,  often  as 
if  done  in  relief.  But  in  comparison  with  modern  times  music 
especially  was  backward,  since  of  all  the  arts  this  least  admits  of 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  109 

plasticity.  Among  the  Greeks  it  was  confined  in  a  severe  rhythmi- 
cal form;  with  us  its  movement  is  not  constrained.  In  the  age  of 
Pericles  it  more  nearly  approached  the  modern  style;  but  this 
departure  was  looked  upon  as  decadent.  In  poetry  likewise  it  was 
the  epic,  the  most  objective  type,  that  the  Greeks  developed  in  the 
most  complete  purity  of  style.  The  modern  epic,  on  the  other  hand, 
has  a  lyrical  coloring,  to  be  seen  externally  in  the  employment  of 
the  strophic  form.  The  ancient  lyric  lacked  romantic  brilliancy 
of  coloring,  fantastic  play  of  sentiment  and  tone,  and  melody  of 
rhyme  and  assonance.  Even  in  this  most  subjective  type,  where 
we  find  the  nearest  approach  to  modern  poetry,  there  was  a  plastic 
clarity  of  thought,  though  considerably  less  than  in  the  epic. 
Tragedy,  however,  exhibited  this  plastic  quality  in  its  utmost  per- 
fection. Here  the  simple,  concise  action  rendered  unity  of  plot 
more  emphatic.  So  far  as  possible,  even  interruptions  through 
change  of  scene  were  avoided,  in  order  that  unity  of  time  and  place 
might  enhanee  the  directness  of  the  spectator's  vision.  Indeed,  all 
devices  for  attaining  the  end  and  aim  of  the  drama — music,  danc- 
ing, scenery,  delivery,  diction,  and  thought — were  so  harmoniously 
conjoined  that  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  of  anything  more  per- 
fect. The  striking  contrast  between  ancient  and  modern  tragedy 
will  be  fully  appreciated  if  we  compare  Aeschylus  with  Shake- 
speare. Shakespearean  tragedy  has  no  immediate  unity;  rather, 
contrasts  of  the  most  glaring  sort,  gross  inconsistencies,  follow  one 
another  in  successive  scenes.  A  colossal  dramatic  apparatus  is  set 
in  motion,  at  first  perplexing  the  spectator's  vision — until  at  length 
the  rich  variety  fuses  in  his  mind  to  a  beautiful  ideal  whole.  All 
the  chords  of  sentiment  are  struck;  the  serious  and  comic  mingle; 
and  in  the  end  the  whole  resolves  itself  into  an  exalted  harmony — 
which  nevertheless  is  not  so  distinct  as  that  of  the  ancient  drama. 
The  intermingling  of  comedy  and  tragedy  in  Shakespeare  illus- 
trates the  general  tendency  of  modern  times  to  obliterate  those  lines 
of  demarcation  between  literary  types  which  the  ancients  rigorously 
observed.  Accordingly,  the  practice  of  poetry,  as  of  art  in  general, 
was  more  limited  as  regards  the  individual  in  ancient  than  in  mod- 
ern times.  No  eminent  Greek  poet  composed,  after  the  fashion,  say, 
of  Goethe,  poems  of  every  sort — epic,  lyric,  and  dramatic,  including 
tragedies  and  comedies.    Each  strove  to  excel  in  a  single  type. 

IV.  So  far  we  have  characterized  Greek  poetry  only  as  one  of 
the  arts;  for  it  developed  in  the  most  intimate  relations  with  the 
rest  of  the  arts.  But  its  medium  of  expression,  language,  in  itself 
illustrates  the  character  of  antiquity  in  classic  perfection.     The 


110  AUGUST  BOECKH 

natural  element  in  language — the  physical  sounds,  that  is, — has 
primarily  an  independent  existence,  and  helps  to  determine  the 
spiritual  content.  And  so  we  find  in  Greek  a  copious  supply  of 
purely  phonetic  distinctions  which  makes  it  possible  to  express  the 
same  idea  by  various  forms.  .■  This  copiousness  was  greatest  during 
the  earliest  period  in  the  formation  of  the  language.  So  long  as  the 
mind  is  wholly  given  over  to  observing  nature,  the  significance  of  the 
elements  of  speech  is  attached  by  the  free  play  of  the  imagination  to 
the  widest  variety  of  objects.  .  .  .  Thus  in  each  mental  repre- 
sentation numerous  observations  run  together,  so  that  the  formation 
of  general  concepts  is  hindered.  The  process  of  thinking  is  re- 
strained through  the  multitude  of  forms.  In  the  modern  languages 
the  striving  toward  unity  is  shown  in  the  elimination,  so  far  as 
possible,  of  purely  phonetic  distinctions.  But  spirit  could  not  have 
won  this  superiority  over  nature  in  the  realm  of  language,  had  not 
the  Greeks  themselves  unshackled  the  process  of  forming  concepts. 
In  the  very  basic  observations  Greek  exhibits  a  depth  and  clearness 
surpassed  only  here  and  there  in  Sanscrit.  But  the  individualizing 
power  of  the  language  is  most  obvious  in  its  wealth  of  roots  and  its 
ductility  and  flexibility  for  combination,  derivation,  and  inflection. 
Thus  each  several  notion  can  be  expressed  in  sharp  outline,  and  the 
language  gains  a  truly  plastic  distinctness.  At  the  same  time  it 
possesses  a  thoroughly  original  stamp  of  its  own.  But  the  feeling 
for  language  among  the  Greeks  had  individual  limitations;  the 
impulse  to  acquire  foreign  tongues,  and  thus  to  secure  a  broader 
outlook,  was  rare.  Because  of  this  narrowness,  antiquity  produced 
no  scientific  historical  grammar,  although  after  the  expeditions  of 
Alexander  sufficient  material  was  at  hand  for  linguistic  comparison. 
It  is  true,  the  more  universal  feeling  for  language  in  modern  times 
has  led  to  a  linguistic  mixture  quite  alien  to  the  Greeks,  with  the 
result  that  the  national  purity  of  languages  has  suffered.  Language 
originally  expresses  real,  concrete  perceptions  that  are  pictures  of 
the  ideas.  In  antiquity  that  native  significance  of  words  was  still 
more  vividly  preserved  in  consciousness,  so  that  even  in  prose  the 
language  remained  more  poetical.  But  with  the  final  development 
of  Greek  science  began  the  universal  spiritualization  of  language, 
a  process  thereupon  carried  over  into  Latin,  and  subsequently  into 
the  modern  languages.  Words  became  the  immediate  symbols  of 
ideas,  and  the  original  meaning  for  the  senses  ceased  to  be  present 
in  consciousness.  This  change  has  been  accelerated  by  the  taking 
over  of  scientific  terms  from  Greek  and  Latin  into  the  modern  lan- 
guages, where  they  lose  their  popular  connotation.    But  the  process 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  111 

of  spiritualization  involves  the  danger  that  the  meaning  of  words 
will  fade  away  into  unvisualized  abstractions.  In  Greek  even  the 
inner  relations  of  concepts  are  expressed  as  clearly  as  possible  by 
outer  symbols,  in  the  form  of  the  sounds ;  while  in  modern  languages 
the  formal  element  (as,  for  example,  inflections)  tends  more  and 
more  to  disappear,  and  the  structure  must  be  inferred  from  the 
inner  relation  of  the  concepts.  The  only  clue  to  this  relation  is  the 
word-order,  which  is  therefore  more  rigorously  fixed,  and  has  a 
logical  importance,  whereas  in  Greek  it  mainly  served  rhetorical 
and  poetical  ends.  The  same  is  true  in  the  metrical  form  of  lan- 
guage. In  Greek  the  accent  depends  upon  quantity,  and  the  latter 
is  not  determined  by  the  meaning,  for  the  relation  is  purely 
rhythmical.  But  in  the  last,  the  Christian,  stage  of  antiquity,  the 
firm,  plastic,  quantitative  distinctions  of  Greek  and  Latin  disap- 
peared, and  thereafter  quantity  depended  upon  stress  and  accent, 
a  principle  that  has  become  dominant  in  the  nations  of  modern 
Europe.  Here  stress  depends  in  part  on  logical  relations,  which 
in  the  Germanic  languages  also  determine  word-accent.  But  at 
the  same  time  in  tone  and  accent  we  have  the  melodic  element  of 
language,  without  which  subjective  feeling  in  language  cannot  gain 
complete  expression.  Consequently  the  basis  of  versification  in  the 
sentimental  poetry  of  modern  times  is  a  symmetry  of  stress  indi- 
cated by  accent,  aided  by  the  equally  melodic  unison  of  rhyme  and 
assonance ;  whereas  in  antiquity  rhythmical  stress  very  often  failed 
to  coincide  with  word-accent,  and  the  repetition  of  like  sounds  was 
avoided.  The  German  language  has  shown  a  capacity  for  com- 
bining the  metrical  principles  of  quantity  and  accent. 

In  every  domain  of  Greek  literature,  language,  the  organ  of 
knowledge,  had  attained  complete  artistic  perfection  before  the 
theoretical  life  had  withdrawn  so  far  into  the  inmost  being  of  the 
thinker  that  science  reached  its  full  development;  for  science  did 
not  come  into  flower  until  genuine  antiquity  was  departing.  Ac- 
cordingly, it  could  undergo  no  such  universal  diffusion  as  in  mod- 
ern times.  Among  the  Greeks  art  had  the  supremacy  over  science ; 
with  us  the  situation  is  reversed.  The  ancients  had  relatively  as 
many  statues  as  we  have  books,  and  likewise  as  few  books  as  we 
have  statues.  The  explanation  is  that  art,  as  opposed  to  science,  is 
an  objectifying  of  the  theoretical  life.  We  are  not  justified  in 
tracing  the  universal  spread  of  scientific  education  in  modern  times 
to  external  causes  like  the  invention  of  printing;  far  rather,  the 
demand  for  education  is  itself  responsible  for  such  inventions.  And 
this  general  demand  arises  from  the  fact  that  ever  since  the  scho- 


112  AUGUST  BOECKH 

lastic  philosophy  of  the  Middle  Ages  the  entire  life  of  modern 
Europe  has  been  more  and  more  completely  dominated  by  scientific 
theory.  The  content  of  this  last,  however,  is  to  a  marked  degree 
more  universal  than  with  the  ancients,  because  the  circle  of  expe- 
rience in  regard  to  nature  and  history  has  grown  until  our  scientific 
investigations  now  take  in  the  entire  globe,  and  consequently  stretch 
away  without  bound  or  limit  into  the  universe.  But  the  ultimate 
foundations  of  things  and  of  knowledge  cannot  be  derived  from 
experience ;  from  the  earliest  times  they  have  emerged  in  the  crea- 
tive activity  of  thought  itself.  These  foundations  Greek  philosophy 
had  already  apprehended  in  full,  since  individual  freedom  of  con- 
sciousness was  sufficient  thereto.  As  long  as  speculation  among  the 
Greeks  was  unhampered  by  an  excess  of  unsubdued  empirical  sub- 
ject-matter, just  so  long  did  they  continue  to  fashion  the  most 
fundamental  ideas  of  philosophy  with  fresh  and  youthful  inspira- 
tion; and,  more  than  any  other,  Plato  displayed  them  in  plastic 
perfection.  For  this  reason  ancient  philosophy  has  an  imperishable 
value.  But  in  the  empirical  sciences,  if  the  individual  limitation 
of  antiquity  led  to  a  clear-cut  apprehension  of  particular  phenom- 
ena, it  also  encouraged  one-sided  views.  Aristotle  was  the  original 
founder  of  an  inclusive  polyhistory  which  aimed  to  unite  the  multi- 
tudinous particulars  of  empirical  knowledge  into  one  scientific 
whole,  and  which  throve  and  flourished  at  Alexandria.  But  the 
fund  of  experience  was  too  limited;  the  special  sciences  could  not 
preserve  that  unity,  and  lost  themselves  in  a  multiplicity  of  de- 
tailed investigations;  and  at  the  same  time  philosophy  became  dis- 
organized under  the  influence  of  empirical  scepticism.  For  all 
that,  Alexandrian  learning  is  absolutely  modern  in  character,  and 
the  quality  of  modern  times  is  also  evinced  in  the  universal  culti- 
vation of  science  to  which  that  learning  gave  rise.  Science  had 
previously  been  carried  on  by  individual  investigators  working  in 
isolation;  and  in  the  schools  of  philosophy  and  rhetoric  a  single 
teacher  was  the  nucleus  of  a  group  of  pupils  who  studied  with  him 
alone ;  but  in  the  Museum  of  Alexandria  we  have  the  first  establish- 
ment of  a  great  scientific  community,  which  in  turn  became  the 
model  for  similar  foundations  elsewhere.  These  institutions,  how- 
ever, simply  mark  the  first  steps  in  the  formation  of  that  universitas 
litterarum  toward  which  our  academies  and  universities  are  striv- 
ing— although  the  term  university  at  first  had  by  no  means  the  sig- 
nificance which  the  Germans  give  it.  As  the  sciences  have  developed 
and  become  more  comprehensive,  they  have  in  modern  times 
tended  in  a  different  direction  from  that  of  antiquity ;  they  have  be- 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  113 

come  fundamentally  more  spiritual  and  inward,  as  well  as  freer  and 
more  ideal.  In  the  beginnings  of  ancient  philosophy  the  contempla- 
tion of  nature,  and  that  alone,  was  paramount.  With  Socrates  and 
Plato  came  the  addition  of  ethics;  yet  no  matter  what  stage  of 
perfection  this  attained,  it  seized  upon  ethical  relations  rather  on 
the  objective  side.  The  concept  of  spiritual  freedom  was  not 
clearly  apprehended  by  the  ancient  philosophers.  In  modern  phi- 
losophy the  object  of  knowledge  has  more  and  more  come  to  be  the 
process  of  knowing,  and  precisely  in  this  way  science  becomes 
aware  of  its  own  nature,  and  free.  Here  again,  through  the  inter- 
pretation he  gave  to  yvwfli  oreavi-ov,  Socrates  encroached  upon  the 
modern  conception  of  things.  As  for  the  empirical  sciences,  with 
the  ancients  historical  investigation  was  eminently  realistic.  The 
sequence  of  facts  was  the  main  concern.  The  external  course  of 
events  was  portrayed  with  great  clearness,  and  indeed  not  without 
a  feeling  for  inner  motives.  But  the  basic  psychological  analysis 
was  imperfect,  and  investigation  of  leading  ideas  in  history  was 
almost  wholly  lacking.  This  was  quite  natural,  since  everything 
was  particular  history,  and  the  facts  were  not  seen  in  their  signifi- 
cance for  the  history  of  the  world.  In  the  history  of  philosophy 
and  science — that  is,  of  the  inner  life  of  the  spirit — the  ancients 
did  not  advance  beyond  mere  beginnings.  In  natural  scienee  mod- 
ern times  at  first  glance  seem  to  be  more  empirical,  and  hence  more 
external,  than  antiquity;  yet  one  must  not  compare  the  ancient 
philosophy  of  nature  with  our  empirical  natural  science.  Ancient 
empiricism  was  in  the  main  based  upon  simple  observation,  and 
was  therefore  more  natural  and  realistic.  With  the  moderns  every- 
thing is  tested  by  experiment,  which  rests  upon  free  combination. 
Our  empiricism  therefore  is  more  spiritual,  more  ideal ;  and  the  same 
thing  holds  true  of  our  speculations  about  nature  in  comparison 
with  those  of  the  ancients.  Even  in  mathematics  we  see  the  special 
quality  of  the  ancient  attitude.  Corresponding  to  the  plastic  char- 
acter of  antiquity,  ancient  mathematics  tended  to  the  considera- 
tion of  geometrical  form.  Arithmetic  was  therefore  less  highly 
developed,  and  was  itself  referred  to  geometrical  schemata.  Con- 
versely, the  moderns  treat  geometry  more  after  the  fashion  of 
arithmetic,  reducing  spatial  relations  to  abstract  formulas.  The 
beginnings  of  analytical  geometry,  it  is  true,  belong  to  antiquity, 
but  the  subject  was  little  developed  by  the  ancients,  since  for  them 
the  constructive  procedure  was  always  the  principal  thing. 

Thus  far  we  have  considered  the  Hellenic  character  as  a  whole. 
But  Hellenism  included  important  differences  which  may  be  classed 


114  AUGUST  BOECKH 

according  to  space  and  time.  By  virtue  of  the  individualizing  ten- 
dency of  the  Greek  spirit,  each  several  Hellenic  state  had  its  own 
peculiar  stamp,  and  all  these  peculiarities  had  their  roots  in  the 
characters  of  the  main  racial  stocks.  Differences  of  stock  were  of 
natural  origin,  and  can  be  explained  only  as  the  combined  effect 
of  native  disposition  and  climate.  They  became  fixed  through  habit, 
and  finally,  when  the  stock  grew  conscious  of  its  special  quality, 
were  purposely  fostered.  The  most  important  difference  lay  in 
the  contrast  between  the  Doric  character  and  the  Ionic;  for  the 
Aeolic  and  Attic  can  be  understood  only  with  reference  to  these. 
The  Dorians  were  originally  a  people  of  the  mountains,  and  in  the 
narrow  highland  valleys  of  Doris  and  Thessaly,  under  the  most 
primitive  conditions  of  life,  their  harsh  and  rugged  disposition  grew 
extraordinarily  firm  and  strong.  As  a  conquering  race  they  later 
continued  to  hold  a  place  apart ;  and  while  outwardly  they  appeared 
hard,  severe,  and  unsusceptible,  in  them  the  Greek  spirit  sank 
inward  to  the  greatest  depth  of  which  it  was  capable.  From  the 
beginning  the  Ionians  were  found  everywhere  on  the  seaboard  in 
Asia  Minor  and  Hellas.  Under  the  influence  of  their  natural  envi- 
ronment and  mode  of  life,  their  naturally  more  yielding  and  flexible 
disposition  became  gentle  and  mobile.  They  were  susceptible  to  all 
impressions — graceful  and  social,  but  at  the  same  time  superficial 
and  pleasure-loving.  The  name  Aeolians  originally  included  all 
stocks  except  the  Dorians  and  Ionians.  The  Aeolic  character  at 
first  was  closely  related  to  the  Doric;  but  as  they  developed,  the 
Aeolians,  generally  speaking,  united  Doric  harshness  with  Ionic 
superficiality  and  love  of  pleasure,  carrying  the  defects  of  both 
stocks  to  the  point  of  eccentricity.  Theirs  was  an  overbearing, 
bombastic,  often  unwieldy  nature,  and  with  them  an  outward  show 
of  culture  was  often  coupled  with  inward  coarseness.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Athenians,  who  were  of  the  Ionic  stock,  appropriated  the 
better  traits  of  the  Dorians,  and  the  Attic  character  represented 
the  golden  mean  between  the  extremes  of  the  Doric  and  Ionic. 

The  influence  exerted  by  these  differences  of  stock  upon  the  entire 
culture  of  the  Greek  nation  was  duly  recognized  in  antiquity  itself. 
In  almost  every  province  of  life  the  ancients  characterized  their 
various  individual  tendencies  by  the  names  of  the  racial  stems. 
Their  forms  of  government  were  divided  into  Doric  and  Ionic ;  the 
Doric  being  the  old  aristocracy,  which  the  Dorians  were  the  last 
to  give  up.  It  was  displaced  among  the  Ionians  by  the  timocracy 
and  democracy,  which  later  found  entrance  into  the  remaining 
states.    The  genuine  Aeolic  form  was  the  oligarchy,  a  mixture  of 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  115 

aristocracy  and  timocracy.  In  private  life  also  the  ancients  dis- 
tinguished an  Ionic  and  a  Doric  fashion.  In  matters  of  housing, 
food,  and  raiment,  the  life  of  the  Dorians  was  restricted  to  the 
bare  necessities,  whereas  the  Ionic  type  was  soft  and  luxurious. 
Here  again  the  Athenians  preserved  the  golden  mean.  Systematic 
hardening  in  the  way  of  life  had  its  origin  with  the  Dorians ;  and 
since  with  them  the  women  also  were  made  robust  by  gymnastics, 
the  Dorian  woman  had  a  masculine  mind.  Her  social  position  was 
correspondingly  freer  than  in  the  other  states  of  Greece,  and  cer- 
tain individuals  rose  to  a  high  degree  of  intellectual  culture.  The 
Aeolic  way  of  life  was  ostentatious  and  extravagant.  As  the  racial 
character  expressed  itself  especially  in  the  language,  the  Doric 
dialect  was  termed  by  the  ancients  the  masculine,  and  the  Ionic  the 
feminine.  The  Aeolic  was  the  most  archaic,  more  cumbrous  than 
the  Doric,  and  remarkably  pompous.  The  Attic  was  not  so  wanting 
in  vigor  as  the  Ionic  of  Asia  Minor.  There  were  also  rhetorical 
differences  according  to  stock,  Doric  'brachylogy'  being  opposed  to 
Ionic  'macrology.'  In  literature  the  Ionians  developed  the  epic, 
which  was  completely  in  accord  with  their  nature ;  and  their  dialect 
served  as  a  basis  for  that  of  the  type.  As  the  natural  overflow  of 
the  feelings,  lyrical  poetry  was  cultivated  among  all  stocks.  But 
there  was  a  very  characteristic  difference  between  the  sentimental 
Ionic  elegy  and  the  passionate  Aeolic  melos;  while  in  the  Doric 
choral  odes  lyrical  poetry  reached  its  high-water  mark.  From  this 
point  on,  the  Doric  dialect  prevailed  in  the  lyric,  so  that  even  in 
the  drama,  which  was  developed  at  Athens,  and  in  which  epic  and 
lyric  elements  are  fused  together,  the  choral  odes  take  on  the  Doric 
character,  and  even  a  Doric  coloring  as  to  language.  Among  prose 
types,  history,  like  the  epic,  arose  in  Ionia.  Philosophy,  like  the 
lyric,  is  the  common  property  of  all  the  stocks.  But  from  the  out- 
set there  was  a  contrast  between  the  systems  of  the  Ionian  natural 
philosophers  and  those  of  the  Doric  schools  of  Italy;  while  the 
antinomy  of  both  was  intensified  in  the  Eleatic  school  (which  bore 
the  Aeolic  character),  and  was  solved  by  philosophical  criticism, 
which  Socrates  founded,  and  which  was  genuinely  Attic.  Rhetoric, 
too,  developed  in  Attica,  its  germs,  like  those  of  the  drama,  being 
Doric.  Differences  emanating  from  the  stocks  were  least  evident  in 
the  mythology.  Still,  the  Doric  and  Ionic  cults  may  be  distin- 
guished in  much  the  same  way  as  the  corresponding  two  manners  of 
life,  the  Doric  being  notably  less  rich,  but  more  profound.  In  all 
departments  of  fine  art,  on  the  other  hand,  the  differences  between 
the  stocks  were  of  the  utmost  importance,  and  the  Greeks  them- 


116  AUGUST  BOECKH 

selves  named  the  most  prominent  styles  accordingly.  In  music  the 
oldest  genuinely  Greek  mode  was  the  Doric,  which  was  subsequently 
imitated  in  the  Aeolic  and  Ionic.  Similarly  in  dancing  the  different 
stocks  each  developed  a  thoroughly  national  style.  Of  the  forma- 
tive arts,  architecture  brought  the  differences  of  stock  to  their  most 
complete  expression.  Doric  architecture  was  the  original ;  the  Ionic 
developed  later ;  and  in  Athens  the  spirit  of  the  two  was  united. 

The  development  of  the  Greek  spirit  in  point  of  time  was  mate- 
rially affected  by  the  influence  of  the  characters  of  the  stocks.  The 
pre-Hellenic  age,  during  which  the  Greeks  were  still  thoroughly 
akin  to  the  Orient,  extended  approximately  to  the  first  Olympiad. 
This  earliest  period  was  marked  by  the  patriarchal  form  of 
monarchy,  and  in  literature  by  the  supremacy  of  the  epic.  About 
the  time  when  reckoning  by  Olympiads  began  and  the  genealogies 
of  the  sons  of  Hellen  came  into  existence,  the  main  stocks  emerged, 
and  the  Hellenic  period  proper  started,  which  lasted  down  to  Alex- 
ander the  Great.  Aristocracy  now  became  the  prevailing  form  of 
government,  and  epic  poetry  was  transcended  by  the  lyric,  which 
flourished  as  a  result  of  the  same  heightened  consciousness  that  had 
overthrown  the  patriarchal  monarchy.  Soon  after,  a  strife  broke 
out  between  the  aristocratic  and  democratic  elements,  and  from  this 
arose  a  tyranny,  when  the  popular  leaders  in  most  of  the  Greek 
states  overthrew  the  chief  families,  and  then  set  themselves  up  as 
rulers.  The  Doric  aristocrats,  particularly  those  of  Sparta,  sought 
in  all  parts — including  the  Ionian  states — to  bring  about  the  fall  of 
the  tyranny;  but  with  the  expulsion  of  the  Pisistratidae  from 
Athens  there  spread  through  all  Greek  lands  a  mighty  impetus  for 
freedom.  The  Ionic  timocracy  now  effected  a  reconciliation  be- 
tween the  ruling  families  and  the  people;  and  democracy  did  not 
get  the  upper  hand  until  after  the  Persian  wars.  All  that  the 
separate  stocks  had  produced  in  the  way  of  epic  and  lyrical  poetry 
had  already  become  common  property  of  the  nation  in  the  age  of 
the  tyrants,  so  that  in  literature  the  several  dialects  stood  upon  an 
equal  footing.  Accordingly,  from  the  time  when  Athens  assumed 
the  leadership  among  the  maritime  states,  all  Greek  culture  flowed 
together  in  Attica;  and  thus  the  Hellenic  character  was  perfected 
through  the  interchange  of  racial  peculiarities.  The  climax  of  the 
entire  period  was  the  age  of  Pericles.  After  that,  the  Peloponnesian 
war  disorganized  public  and  private  life,  until  Greece,  through  her 
particularism,  succumbed  to  foreign  rule.  Consequently,  the  time 
shortly  before  Alexander  the  Great  cannot  be  regarded  as  the 
highest  point   in   Hellenic   culture — prose   literature    alone   then 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  117 

reached  its  culmination.  "With  the  supremacy  of  Macedon  began 
the  third  period  of  development,  which  may  be  termed  the  Mace- 
donian. The  several  stocks  no  longer  exercised  any  influence,  al- 
though the  dialects  still  persisted  in  literature.  Since  Attic  culture 
had  prepared  for  the  blending  of  characteristics  from  the  several 
stocks,  the  common  written  language  was  formed  from  the  Attic  dia- 
lect. In  the  Alexandrian  age,  it  is  true,  the  Greek  spirit  continued  to 
make  great  advances  in  science;  yet  these  exceeded  the  essential 
limits  of  antiquity,  and  in  fact  led  to  its  decay.  The  period  of 
actual  decay  began  with  the  supremacy  of  Rome.  During  this 
time  there  was  a  final  epoch  in  the  reign  of  Hadrian  when  Hellenic 
culture  was  artificially  revived. 

Those  men  who  founded  the  history  of  philosophy  thought  the 
essential  trait  of  antiquity  to  be  the  note  of  beauty.  But  in  all 
times,  modern  as  well  as  ancient,  the  ideal  of  art  is  the  beautiful ; 
while  in  other  realms  of  ancient  life  one  can  speak  of  a  'beautiful' 
order  only  in  a  metaphorical  sense.  In  characterizing  the  ancients, 
we  cannot,  for  example,  attribute  to  them  a  'beautiful'  State  or  a 
'beautiful'  political  life.  Beauty  was  so  prominent  in  Hellenic 
life  simply  because  art  was  so  extraordinarily  important  in  that 
life,  and  because,  by  virtue  of  the  individual  culture,  all  sides  of  life 
were  developed  in  wonderful  harmony.  And  an  evidence  of  this 
harmony  was  the  uniform  influence,  in  every  sphere,  of  the  differ- 
ences of  stock;  the  aims  of  individuals  were  in  keeping  with  the 
surrounding  life  of  the  State,  where,  as  we  have  seen,  each  sepa- 
rate person  counted.  Art  and  politics  interpenetrated  each  other. 
The  several  branches  did  not  develop  independently,  but  always  in 
company.  In  the  individual  culture  of  the  Greeks  lay  their  origi- 
nality also.  Now  true  originality  is  normal,  and  hence  Hellenism 
became  the  norm  for  antiquity  as  a  whole.  The  civilization  of  the 
Greeks  vanquished  all  other  civilizations  of  the  ancient  world. 
Their  language  and  customs,  art  and  science,  early  spread,  through 
the  influence  of  their  colonies,  over  Macedonia  and  Thrace  to  the 
remotest  shores  of  the  Black  Sea,  and  yet  further  over  the  coast 
of  Libya;  and  in  the  West  to  Spain,  Gaul,  Sicily,  Italy,  and  Illyria ; 
still  later,  to  the  utmost  extent  of  the  Macedonian  and  the  Roman 
Empire. 

But  in  the  very  nature  of  Hellenic  culture  were  involved  certain 
defects  which  to  a  greater  or  less  extent  belonged  to  all  the  stocks, 
and  which  through  our  method  of  characterization  become  visible 
in  all  departments  of  Greek  life.  In  the  first  place,  Greek  individ- 
ualism had  an  overbalance  of  sensuousness — a  sensuousness  that 


118  AUGUST  BOECKH 

was  entirely  frank  because  natural,  and  hence  even  in  its  excesses 
less  pernicious  than  the  reflective  sensuousness  of  modern  times. 
The  latter,  though,  stands  in  contradiction  to  the  spirit  of  our  civili- 
zation ;  whereas  Hellenic  civilization  became  disorganized  when  phi- 
losophy lifted  the  spirit  of  the  Greeks  to  the  contemplation  of  the 
supersensuous.  A  second  defect  was  egoism,  which  arose  in  antiq- 
uity from  the  particularistic  isolation  of  individuals  and  states. 
True,  egoism  has  by  no  means  been  eradicated  in  modern  times; 
but  it  is  deemed  unethical  because  it  is  opposed  to  the  ideal  of  a 
universal  love  of  mankind,  and  hence  in  the  main  it  attempts  to 
keep  up  an  appearance  of  disinterestedness — which  means,  of 
course,  the  fostering  of  deceit  and  disgusting  hypocrisy.  In  antiq- 
uity, however,  the  principle  of  universal  philanthropy  is  foreign 
to  the  popular  consciousness.  There  were  no  rights  of  man,  but 
only  rights  of  the  citizen.  Egoism  appeared  normal.  The  doctrine 
of  Plato  that  it  is  unjust  to  injure  any  one,  even  an  enemy,  and 
that  it  is  the  task  of  the  good  man  to  reform  the  bad,  is,  of  course, 
in  harmony  with  the  Christian  precept  as  to  loving  one's  enemy; 
but  it  runs  counter  to  the  general  opinion,  enunciated,  for  example, 
by  Xenophon,  that  one  must  injure  one's  enemies  as  much  as  pos- 
sible. Finally,  a  third  defect  in  the  culture  of  the  Greeks  was  the 
narrowness  of  their  conception  of  life.  Says  Goethe :  '  The  modern 
man,  whenever  he  reflects,  almost  always  projects  himself  into  the 
infinite,  to  return  at  last,  if  fortune  favors  him,  to  a  limited  sphere ; 
but  the  ancients  went  straight  to  the  point,  and  found  their  sole 
satisfaction  within  the  pleasant  bounds  of  the  beautiful  earth. 
Here  they  had  been  placed,  and  to  this  they  had  been  called ;  their 
activity  here  found  room,  and  their  passion  object  and  nourish- 
ment. '  Herewith  Goethe  distinguishes  the  point  where  the  culture 
of  the  Greeks  ceased  to  be  harmonious  and  became  narrow.  "While 
they  saw  each  particular  thing  in  its  concrete  shape,  and  in  all 
their  doing  strove  for  supreme  excellence,  the  vision  of  all  things  in 
a  universal  interdependence  was  denied  them. 

But  far  narrower  than  Greek  culture  was  that  of  the  Romans. 
The  limitation  of  the  Greeks  did  not  consist  in  their  seeing  only  one 
side  of  nature  and  spirit,  but  in  their  seeing  all  sides  in  only  one 
way.  In  other  words,  they  saw  things  from  but  a  few  points  of 
view,  and  so  had  a  less  inclusive  apprehension  of  individual  objects 
than  the  peoples  of  modern  times.  The  Greeks  lived  in  the  joyous 
exercise  and  manifold  development  of  their  powers,  and  in  an  abso- 
lute interpenetration  of  theory  and  practice.    Thus  not  all  that  they 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  119 

did  was  done  for  the  sake  of  the  necessities  of  life ;  but  all  bears  the 
stamp  of  humane  culture.  Their  tendency  was  away  from  the 
merely  useful.  The  beautiful  added  to  the  good  was  their  motto. 
The  original  motion  of  their  spirit  toward  the  beautiful  was  re- 
vealed in  the  shape  they  gave  even  to  things  intended  for  mere 
necessary  service.  With  this  liberal  spirit,  this  innate  poetical  and 
aesthetic  sense,  it  was  natural  that  where  they  did  not  actually  dis- 
cover, they  at  least  built  up  all  arts  and  sciences,  and  at  the  same 
time  constructed  wonderfully  perfect  forms  of  government.  On  the 
contrary,  from  the  very  first  the  character  of  the  Romans,  who 
otherwise  were  fundamentally  allied  to  the  kindred  Greeks,  tended 
only  to  the  practical.  The  elemental  Roman  trait  was,  not  joyous 
free  play,  but  practical  earnestness,  or  gravitas.  The  virtus  Romana 
meant  power  and  rigor  in  the  conduct  of  life.  The  Roman  every- 
where strove  after  energetic  external  activity,  together  with  inward 
stability,  and  herein  was  most  nearly  related  to  the  Doric  stock, 
save  that  the  Doric  tendency  to  inner  isolation  was  greater.  The 
harshness  and  inflexibility  of  character  in  the  Dorians  were  more 
in  the  nature  of  an  inward  exclusiveness  of  culture,  while  with 
the  Romans  the  ruling  motive  was  outward  activity.  And  so  the 
Dorians  were  far  more  concerned  with  theory,  bringing  music  and 
poetry  to  a  high  degree  of  cultivation,  while  in  these  arts  the 
Romans  produced  nothing  original.  In  the  immediate  vicinity  of 
Rome,  in  Magna  Graecia,  there  came  into  existence  among  the  Doric 
states  of  the  Pythagorean  alliance  the  most  perfect  union  of  scien- 
tific theory  and  political  practice.  As  for  the  excessively  warlike 
temper  that  distinguished  the  Dorians  from  the  other  Hellenic 
stocks,  this  was  intensified  in  the  Romans,  and  drove  them  on  to 
restless  enterprise.  jAs  the  Greeks  disseminated  culture  through- 
out the  earth,  so  the  Romans  carried  the  sword  into  every  land,  and 
the  Roman  Republic  aimed  at  the  supremacy  of  the  world.  But 
this,  as  we  have  noted,  was  exceeding  the  limits  of  what  was 
characteristic  in  antiquity.  And  besides,  the  republicanism  of 
Rome  was  more  apparent  than  real;  for  that  paramount  leaning 
toward  aristocracy  which  the  Romans  likewise  had  in  common  with 
the  Dorians  steadily  made  for  autocracy.  The  true  democratic 
impulse  was  wanting,  which  among  the  Greeks  gained  the  ascend- 
ancy through  the  Ionic  stock. 

With  their  practical  bias,  the  Romans  were  eminent  in  the  mould- 
ing of  public  and  private  life.  As  for  the  State,  their  quality  was 
above  all  evinced  in  their  peculiar  development  of  things  military. 
The  Greeks  were  not  unwarlike.    Military  tactics  and  strategy  with 


120  AUGUST  BOECKH 

them  became  an  art.  But  this  gifted  race  did  not  possess  the  rigor 
of  the  Roman  manly  training;  even  in  Sparta  the  discipline  was 
less  binding.  Roman  army  regulations,  methods  of  camping,  and 
so  on,  became  the  models  for  all  time.  The  maintenance  of  standing 
armies  was  quite  in  the  modern  spirit,  and  so  was  the  centralized 
strategy,  which  was  an  absolute  departure  from  Greek  methods, 
since  it  allowed  the  least  possible  room  for  individual  discretion. 
As  for  statecraft,  the  Romans  were  the  first  to  exhibit  real  diplo- 
macy in  the  modern  sense.  The  policy  of  Rome  was  consistently 
cold,  calculating,  and  inflexible.  Once  Italy  had  been  subdued  by 
the  Roman  virtus,  that  policy  pursued,  abroad,  the  most  extensive 
plans  of  conquest  with  the  utmost  tenacity  and  endurance,  and  the 
most  refined  cunning.  At  home,  it  meant  a  concatenation  of  shifts 
and  wiles  practiced  by  the  nobility  so  as  to  extend  their  rights  over 
the  whole  State,  and  to  hold  the  people  by  the  shortest  possible  leash. 
The  Greeks  were  far  less  consistent ;  their  policy  was  more  natural. 
They  could  not  attain  to  the  Roman  prudentia,  since  with  them  all 
that  was  done  for  the  guidance  of  the  State  proceeded  from  the 
centre  of  national  feeling  and  popular  consciousness,  whereas  at 
Rome  the  guiding  principle  of  the  State  was  the  intelligence  of  the 
magistrates,  and  the  manner  of  government  was  therefore  more 
external  and  mechanical.  The  greatest  achievement  of  Roman 
policy  was  the  extraordinary  development  of  civil  law.  Cicero 
maintains2  that  the  ius  civile  of  the  Greeks — even  the  codes  of 
Lycurgus,  Draco,  and  Solon — was  'artless,  well-nigh  ridiculous.' 
Such  was  necessarily  the  view  of  the  practical  Roman,  who  strove 
to  discriminate  all  legal  relations  sharply  and  firmly,  when  he  con- 
sidered Greek  law,  wherein  the  pedagogical  element  played  a  great 
role.  From  the  outset  the  patricians  desired  to  regulate  all  rela- 
tions, greatest  and  least,  by  fixed  statutes,  and  the  law  thus  became 
so  involved  that  they  alone  understood  it.  As  a  result  came  the 
ominous  shackles  of  the  clientele/,,  and  the  production  of  a  special 
class  of  jurists.  Among  the  Greeks  there  were  interpreters  in 
sacred  law  only ;  .  .  .  the  TrpayfmriKoi  were  not  highly  esteemed.  It 
seems  to  have  been  very  fortunate  for  Greece  that  philosophers  and 
statesmen  there  took  the  place  of  jurists.  The  form  of  legal  process 
was  much  more  free ;  and  the  laws,  with  all  their  variety,  were  much 
simpler  and  more  purely  human,  so  that  any  one  with  a  political 
training  could  administer  them.  The  entire  practical  wisdom  of 
the  Romans  was  juridical,  while  from  the  beginning  that  of  the 
Greeks  had  a  philosophical  and  poetical  cast,  revealing  a  religious 

2  Cicero,  Be  Oratore  1.  44. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  121 

spirit  that  transcended  common  affairs.  Cicero,  who  seeks  to  exalt 
his  own  race  as  far  as  possible  in  comparison  with  the  Greeks,  in 
praising  the  Romans  always  falls  back  on  their  practical  ability, 
and  if  we  listen  to  the  statesmen  speaking  in  the  dialogue  De  Ora- 
tore,  we  gain  a  very  vivid  idea  of  the  Roman  character.  Among 
the  men  whom  the  Romans  compared  with  the  seven  sages  of  Greece 
were  Tiberius  Coruncanius,  the  first  teacher  of  law;  Publius  Sem- 
pronius,  whose  legal  knowledge  brought  him  the  surname  Sophus; 
Fabricius  and  Mannius  Curius,  the  representatives  of  incorrupt- 
ible justice;  and  Appius  Claudius  Caecus,  who  built  the  Appian 
Way  and  the  Roman  aqueducts.  Along  with  political  wisdom, 
Cicero  praises  the  Romans3  for  their  superiority  in  the  manage- 
ment of  household  affairs :  '  As  for  the  manners  and  customs  of  life, 
and  domestic  and  family  affairs,  we  certainly  manage  them  with 
more  elegance,  and  better  than  they  did.'  In  point  of  fact,  Greek 
family  life  was  likewise  without  that  discipline  which  was  made 
possible  among  the  Romans  by  the  almost  unlimited  patria  postes- 
tas;  and  the  free  and  easy  ways  that  went  with  their  genius  pre- 
vented the  Greeks  from  attaining  in  their  household  affairs  to  the 
exemplary  order  for  which  the  Romans  were  distinguished. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  entire  theoretical  life  of  the  Romans 
remained  on  a  lower  plane  because  it  stood  at  the  service  of  the 
practical.  Religion  was  with  them,  even  more  than  in  Crete  and 
Sparta,  a  state  religion,  a  civil  institution.  Augury  was  a  tool  in 
the  hands  of  the  patricians.  The  cult  did  not  have  the  pure  beauty 
and  speculative  value  in  the  Greek  worship  of  the  gods,  but  included 
considerably  more  of  superstitious  usage  and  much  Etruscan  jug- 
glery. Yet  it  was  most  intimately  linked  with  every  act  of  domestic 
life,  and  was  the  expression  of  deep  and  earnest  religious  feeling; 
whereas  with  the  Greeks  the  practice  of  religion  became  in  many 
respects  a  graceful  pastime.  The  noblest  forms  of  the  ancient 
Roman  cult,  however,  the  institutions  of  Numa,  were  the  result  of 
Greek  influences;  for  Magna  Graecia  arose  in  the  time  of  Numa, 
and  the  story,  untenable  on  chronological  grounds,  which  made 
the  king  a  Pythagorean,  at  all  events  pointed  to  an  acquaintance  on 
his  part  with  the  Greek  civilization  of  lower  Italy.  But  the  serene 
spirit  of  Greek  religion  Numa  could  not  transplant  to  Rome.  Fur- 
ther, Roman  mythology,  a  mixture  of  old  Italian  and  Greek  ele- 
ments, was  far  less  ideal  than  the  Hellenic,  which  itself  was  in  a 
state  of  utter  decay  when  Greek  culture  found  entrance  among  the 
educated  at  Rome.    From  that  time  on,  the  Roman  official  religion 

8  Cicero,  Tuscul.  1. 1.  2. 


122  AUGUST  BOECKH 

became  nothing  more  than  a  political  tool,  and  hence  its  develop- 
ment as  theologia  civilis,  in  the  service  of  practical  demands,  was 
purely  external.  According  to  Augustine,4  Varro  distinguished 
between  theologia  mythica,  physica,  and  civilis — that  is,  between 
poetical,  philosophical,  and  civil  theology, — while  the  Greeks  had 
only  the  first  two  divisions,  since  with  them  the  civil  religion  was 
in  fact  the  poetical.  The  underlying  reason  was  that  the  Romans 
lacked  the  poetical  bent.  In  art  and  science  generally  they  were  not 
original,  and  what  they  took  from  the  Greeks  they  developed  inde- 
pendently only  in  so  far  as  it  subserved  practical  needs.  Cicero 
himself  is  forced  to  admit  this,  though  he  thinks  that  the  Romans 
could  have  excelled  the  Greeks  in  art  and  science  as  well,  if  only 
they  had  desired  to.  'It  has  always  been  my  opinion,'  he  says, 
'that,  with  regard  to  the  subjects  they  have  deemed  worth  their 
attention,  our  countrymen  have  in  some  instances  made  wiser  dis- 
coveries than  the  Greeks,  and  in  others  have  improved  upon  their 
discoveries,  so  that  we  surpass  them  in  every  point.'5  The  practi- 
cal sense  of  the  Roman,  of  course,  disdained  everything  unpracti- 
cal, for  the  very  reason  that  his  gifts  did  not  tend  that  way. 
Cicero,  on  the  contrary,  believes  that  if  the  artistic  genius  of  a 
Fabius  Pictor  had  been  appreciated,  the  Romans  could  have  pointed 
to  their  Polycletus  and  Parrhasius.  In  his  opinion  music  flourished 
among  the  Greeks  simply  because  of  universal  appreciation,  since 
even  the  greatest  statesmen  had  received  a  musical  education.6  The 
truth  is  that  the  Romans,  lacking  the  talent,  had  no  desire,  either, 
for  theoretical  pursuits.  Consequently  art  and  science  were  not 
honored,  and  this  in  turn  reacted  to  hamper  them.  In  point  of 
fact,  at  Rome  a  poet  like  Sophocles,  who  took  part  in  the  acting 
of  his  own  plays,  could  never  have  been  appointed  a  general.  Since 
a  levis  notae  macula  attached  to  the  artist,  the  nobler  spirits  could 
hardly  apply  themselves  to  art.  But  even  when  Greek  culture  came 
into  vogue,  and  the  prejudice  was  to  some  extent  overcome,  the 
Romans,  however  great  their  zeal,  could  not  equal  the  Greeks. 
They  were  weakest  on  the  side  of  music,  standing  far  behind  Crete 
and  Sparta.  Greek  music  was  introduced  as  a  luxury,  as  a  form 
of  entertainment,  and  the  Romans  simply  turned  it  over  to  Greek 
musicians.  Similarly  the  art  of  gymnastics,  something  purely 
Greek,  in  spite  of  all  artificial  attempts,  never  became  domesticated 
at  Rome.    For  its  purpose — the  harmonious  development  of  body 

*  Augustine,  De  Cvvitate  Dei  6.  5. 

5  Cicero,  Tuscul.  1. 1. 1. 

o  Compare  the  Proem,  in  Cornel.  Nep. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  123 

and  soul — the  Romans  had  no  appreciation.  Their  recreations  were 
of  a  different  order — swimming,  ball-playing,  the  warlike  ludi 
Circenses,  gladiatorial  contests,  and  beast-baiting.  In  the  art  of 
building  they  showed  independence  only  in  the  construction  of 
roads  and  fortresses.  The  really  artistic  element  in  architecture 
was  originally  as  foreign  to  them  as  were  sculpture  and  painting; 
but  when  they  had  developed  a  taste  for  it  through  the  Greeks, 
they  did  produce  a  style  of  building  corresponding  to  their  own 
character.  Even  in  the  art  of  poetry  they  made  no  independent 
progress  beyond  the  first  rude  beginnings.  To  this  stage  belonged 
the  old  religious  songs,  which,  aside  from  the  artless  and  unchang- 
ing ritual  chants,  were  in  the  main  oracular,  and  hence  in  their 
very  nature  did  not  aim  at  artistic  representation,  having  rather 
the  practical  end  of  guiding  and  determining  the  actions  of  men 
through  predicting  the  future ;  and  hence  the  Greek  Sibylline  books 
were  an  early  dower  for  the  Roman  State.  In  addition,  from  early 
times  festival  occasions  in  public  and  private  life  were  attended 
with  singing,  to  which  the  tibia  most  commonly  formed  the  accom- 
paniment. To  this  class  also  belonged  the  songs  in  praise  of  ances- 
tors, sung  by  the  youths  at  banquets.  Niebuhr's  view  that  an  old 
national  epic  developed  out  of  these  songs  has,  however,  been  proved 
untenable.  Rome  never  possessed  on  its  native  soil  an  infancy  of 
culture;  it  had  no  mythical  tale  of  heroes.  From  the  outset  its 
heroes  were  statesmen.  Thus  all  the  conditions  essential  to  the 
rise  of  an  epic  were  missing.  Nor  was  there,  as  in  the  heroic  age 
of  Greece,  a  class  of  minstrels;  and  so  there  was  no  folk-poetry — 
for  this  lives  in  the  mouth  of  the  minstrels.  It  is  true,  the  Romans 
were  always  intent  upon  preserving  the  memory  of  the  deeds  done 
by  their  forefathers;  but  from  the  earliest  times  this  was  accom- 
plished through  written  records.  Noteworthy  political  and  reli- 
gious events  were  registered  in  the  annales  pontificum  and  the 
commentarii  magistratuum;7  furthermore,  the  patricians  kept 
domestic  and  family  chronicles.  Accordingly,  whereas  the  writing 
of  history  among  the  Greeks  developed  out  of  epic  poetry  and 
mythology,  unhampered  by  any  influence  from  the  State,  among 
the  Romans  it  was  by  its  origin  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the  word 
pragmatical,  and  the  records,  being  devised  for  necessary  ends, 
were  meagre  and  prosaic.  They  were  supplemented  by  the  docu- 
ments of  sacred  and  civil  law,  including  the  libri  and  commentarii 
pontificum,  the  fasti,  the  leges,  the  libri  lintei,  and  so  on.     These 

•  K.   W.   Nitzsch,  Die  Bomische  Annalistilc,   pp.    189-242 ;    Geschichte   der 
Bomischen  Bepublik  1. 191-203. 


1 


124  AUGUST  BOECKH 

earliest  writings  comprised  the  fundamentals  of  Roman  national 
knowledge — the  doctrina  civilis. 

The  year  240  B.  C.  marks  the  beginning  of  an  artistic  literature 
at  Rome,  for  in  that  year  Andronicus,  a  Greek  captured  at  the 
fall  of  Tarentum,  brought  upon  the  stage  the  first  tragedy  trans- 
lated from  the  Greek.  Scenic  plays,  the  ludi  Fescennini,  the 
Romans  had  at  a  very  early  date ;  but  these  were  improvised  farces 
in  which  Roman  gravity  displayed  itself  in  a  cumbersome  and 
grotesque  form  of  raillery.  Tragedy  must  have  been  particularly 
congenial  to  the  seriousness  of  the  people ;  and  how  well  the  enter- 
prise of  Andronicus  was  received  may  be  inferred  from  the  honor 
bestowed  upon  him  of  corporate  rights  as  poet.  From  this  time  on, 
the  Romans  rapidly  acquired  a  taste  for  Greek  literature.  With 
tragedy  they  also  appropriated  comedy,  and  native  materials  from 
Roman  tradition  were  employed  in  both.  The  fabula  praetexta, 
especially  in  the  form  given  to  it  by  Pacuvius,  was  truly  sublime 
and  powerful,  even  though  it  lacked  the  harmonious  structure  of 
Greek  tragedy.  Comedy,  too,  the  palliata  as  well  as  the  togata,  was 
originally  in  the  high  style,  like  that  of  Attic  comedy,  only  far 
more  cumbrous;  for  the  Greek  7rcuSia  always  remained  foreign  to 
the  Romans.  The  epic,  which  Andronicus  introduced  by  trans- 
lating the  Odyssey,  was  similarly  employed  without  delay  upon 
materials  from  the  national  history.  After  the  Bellum  Poenicum 
of  Naevius  came  the  Annates  of  Ennius,  dealing  with  the  entire 
history  of  Rome,  which  was  continued  by  subsequent  poets.  Still, 
the  more  familiar  the  Romans  became  with  Greek  literature,  the 
more  they  imitated  it.  The  great  achievements  of  the  Greeks  en- 
cumbered the  Roman  spirit  with  examples,  and  hampered  the  fur- 
ther development  of  those  achievements  in  any  original  way;  the 
more  so  as  poetry  never  ceased  to  be  regarded  superficially,  as 
merely  entertaining  and  diverting,  and  hence,  though  it  was  duly 
encouraged  by  munificent  patrons,  found  no  abiding-place  in  the 
artistic  sense  of  the  nation.  One  literary  type  only  was  the  special 
property  of  the  Romans,  namely,  satire,  in  which  the  old  burlesque 
chaffing  and  joking  songs  of  Rome  were  transformed  into  something 
artistic.  Horace  justly  calls  it8  a  Graecis  intactum  carmen.  In 
Greek  literature  there  was  nothing  even  approximately  like  it 
except  the  silloi;  to  the  satyric  drama — the  similarity  of  name  is 
purely  accidental — it  is  in  no  way  related.  This  literary  form,  half 
poetry,  half  prose,  the  Roman  poets  succeeded  in  filling  with  a 
profusion  of  ideas  on  life,  of  wit,  and  of  mordant  lampooning  and 

8  Horace,  Serm.  1.10.  66. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  125 

ridicule.  Jest  is  here  in  true  Roman  fashion  seriously  employed 
upon  life.  Further,  in  two  types  of  prose  literature  the  Romans, 
under  the  influence  of  Greek  models,  accomplished  significant  re- 
sults— that  is,  in  history  and  oratory.  Even  before  Ennius 
reclothed  the  old  state  chronicles  in  the  garb  of  poetry,  Quintus 
Fabius  Pictor  had  portrayed  all  Roman  history,  in  the  Greek 
language,  for  the  circle  of  educated  patricians.  In  the  face  of 
this,  the  elder  Cato  began  a  system  of  compiling  annals  in  Latin 
that  was  independent  of  the  State.  But  with  Sallust,  Roman 
history  for  the  first  time  assumed  an  artistic  form  entirely  modeled 
after  the  Greek,  though  it  never  attained  to  the  character  of  an 
art  independent  in  its  manner  of  presentation,  such  as  that  of  the 
Greeks.  It  is  precisely  the  most  original  Roman  historians,  Sal- 
lust  and  Tacitus,  that  depart  the  farthest  from  the  genuinely  plas- 
tic manner  of  antiquity,  and  do  so  through  the  subjective  and 
sentimental  coloring  they  give  to  their  facts.  As  for  oratory,  it 
formed  the  essential  basis  for  Roman  prose.  Appius  Claudius 
Caecus,  Quintus  Fabius  Cunctator,  and  after  them  the  elder  Cato, 
had  recorded  their  speeches;  and  soon  the  Greek  models  were 
studied  with  such  success  that  Cicero9  could  declare  the  Romans  to 
be  little  or  not  at  all  inferior  to  the  Greeks.  Cicero  himself,  it  is 
true,  in  comparison  with  Demosthenes  often  seems  like  a  tattler  in 
the  presence  of  a  true  orator.  But  then,  with  all  his  gifts  and 
culture,  Cicero  was  not  a  great,  genuinely  Roman  character — he 
lacked  the  virtus  Romana.  In  weight  and  dignity  the  genuine 
eloquence  of  the  Romans  actually  surpassed  that  of  the  Greeks. 
And  herein  the  language  of  Rome  likewise  had  the  advantage;  for 
no  other  language  in  the  world  permits  one  to  speak  and  write  with 
more  nobility  and  vigor  than  does  Latin.  From  the  first  it  had 
the  general  character  of  antiquity — in  tone  and  accent,  too;  for 
the  supposition  is  untenable  that  in  the  earliest  period  the  accent 
was  like  that  of  the  modern  languages,  and  not  dependent  upon 
quantity.  But  whereas  Greek  had  every  tone,  running  the  whole 
gamut  of  expression  from  the  utmost  sweetness  and  flexibility  to 
the  greatest  power  and  austerity,  Latin  developed  in  a  single  direc- 
tion, namely  that  represented  in  Greek  by  the  harsh  but  powerful 
Aeolic  dialect,  to  which,  in  tone  and  accent,  Latin  itself  is  most 
nearly  related.  Precisely  by  virtue  of  this  one-sidedness,  however, 
the  language  became  the  most  adequate  form  of  expression  for  the 
Roman  gravitas.  The  stress  itself  serves  to  illustrate  this,  since 
all  polysyllabic  words  were  barytones.  For  all  the  practical  rela- 
o  Cicero,  Tuscul.  1.  3. 1. 


126  AUGUST  BOECKH 

tions  of  life  the  language  produced  the  most  significant  forms ;  on 
the  other  hand,  it  had  a  very  limited  range  of  expression  for  more 
general  concepts,  without  circumlocution,  and  offered  very  imper- 
fect forms  for  speculative  ideas.  In  philosophy  and  pure  theoreti- 
cal science,  again,  the  Romans  did  not  increase  the  fund  of  knowl- 
edge derived  from  the  Greeks.  Philosophy  is  something  over  and 
above  the  necessities  of  life,  and  requires  a  mind  intent  upon  the 
hidden  depths  of  things — which  the  Romans  never  possessed.  They 
were  friendly  to  energetic  action,  and  not  susceptible  to  the  lure 
of  speculation,  in  which  the  Greek  spirit  found  its  highest  satisfac- 
tion. The  Roman  gravitas  was  not  the  seriousness  of  the  thinker, 
but  that  of  a  man  immersed  in  affairs.  Philosophy  leads  to  otium, 
but  the  Roman  prized  only  negotium.  Consequently  all  men  of 
austere  convictions  saw  in  the  introduction  of  Greek  science  a 
danger  to  good  morals.  Such  Greek  philosophers  and  rhetoricians 
as  came  to  Rome  were  banished  from  the  city  by  decrees  of  the 
Senate.  At  first  not  even  grammarians  were  tolerated,  nor  Greek 
physicians,  either.  Had  not  the  fathers  got  along  for  five  hundred 
years  without  medical  science?  Decrees  of  the  Senate,  it  is  true, 
were  of  no  avail.  Yet  the  pursuit  of  science  at  Rome  long  remained 
virtually  in  the  hands  of  the  Greeks.  On  account  of  their  practi- 
cal value,  philological  studies  were  the  first  to  be  pursued  by 
Romans  after  the  fashion  of  the  Greek  grammarians,  and  the  body 
of  ancient  law  underwent  a  scientific  investigation.  In  all  other 
sciences  only  the  practical  side  was  taken  up.  Thus  mathematics, 
for  example,  which  the  Greeks  had  developed  into  an  admirable 
theoretical  system,  was  cultivated  at  Rome  only  for  the  art  of  com- 
puting and  surveying.  Cicero  significantly  remarks:10  'Geometry 
was  in  high  esteem  with  them,  and  so  none  were  more  honorable 
than  the  mathematicians;  but  we  have  confined  this  art  to  useful 
measuring  and  calculating.'  On  that  showing,  the  Romans  stand 
on  the  level  of  Strepsiades  in  the  Clouds  of  Aristophanes,  for  he 
takes  geometry  to  mean  the  practice  of  measuring  the  lands  of  the 
cleruchi.  Of  course  the  great  Greek  mathematicians  were  notable 
also  for  practical  mechanical  inventions,  but  they  attached  far  less 
value  to  these  than  to  their  theoretical  discoveries.  At  Rome  the 
pursuit  of  philosophy  was  for  most  persons  a  matter  of  fashion, 
and  was  looked  upon  as  a  form  of  amusement.  In  the  number  of 
the  servants  it  was  quite  proper  to  keep  a  house-philosopher  along 
with  the  Greek  cook  and  the  paedagogus.     It  just  suited  Roman 

10  Cicero,  Tuscul.  1.  2.  5. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  127 

taste  when  Terence11  mentioned  canes,  equi,  and  philosophi  to- 
gether— though  Terence  probably  borrowed  the  joke  from  Menan- 
der,  since  in  Athens  narrowly  practical  statesmen  evinced  the  same 
contempt  for  philosophy  as  is  expressed  by  Anytus  in  Plato 's  Meno. 
Only  a  few  Romans  sought  in  philosophy  a  deeper  culture.  Nobler 
natures  accepted  Stoicism,  the  philosophy  of  activity  and  endur- 
ance, since  this  was  most  in  keeping  with  the  Roman  temper.  But, 
like  other  Greek  systems,  it  was  popularized;  and  the  sole  phi- 
losophical achievement  of  the  Romans,  when  all  is  said,  was  an 
eclectic  popular  philosophy.  Under  the  empire  there  grew  up  with 
a  diminished  participation  in  the  life  of  the  State  a  taste  for  the 
sciences,  and  from  the  time  of  Hadrian  this  was  encouraged  by  the 
establishment  of  numerous  public  academies.  Even  so,  philosophy 
and  the  purely  theoretical  disciplines  were  still  valued  only  as  a 
means  to  an  encyclopedic  education,  whose  highest  aim  was  a 
shallow  declamatory  art  of  rhetoric.  And  at  the  imperial  schools, 
particularly  the  great  academies  founded  in  the  year  425  by  Theo- 
dosius  the  Second  and  Valentinian  the  Third  in  Constantinople  and 
Rome,  attention  was  more  and  more  restricted  to  bread-and-butter 
studies.  Thus  through  the  Roman  principle  of  utility  the  advance 
of  science  was  hindered,  and  was  gradually  limited  to  the  trans- 
mission of  extant  knowledge,  until  finally  the  most  needful  informa- 
tion was  brought  together  in  compendiums,  which  in  the  Middle 
Ages  continued  for  over  five  hundred  years  to  be  the  only  source  of 
Western  scientific  culture. 

Roman  civilization  lacked  the  rich  variety  which  Greek  civiliza- 
tion owed  to  the  combined  influence  of  the  different  racial  stocks. 
Apart  from  the  Celtic  admixture  in  the  North,  and  the  Greek  in  the 
South,  the  Italic  stocks  were  related  to  one  another  like  those  of 
Greece,  although  a  general  Italic  national  character  can  hardly  be 
demonstrated.  But  save  for  the  Etruscans,  whose  influence  upon 
the  Roman  spirit  was  marked,  no  stock  in  Italy  rose  to  equal  impor- 
tance with  the  Roman;  and  through  political  supremacy,  the  lan- 
guage and  culture  of  the  city  of  Rome  became  the  norm  for  all  her 
subjects.  In  comparison  with  what  was  urbanum,  every  deviation 
was  disdained  as  rusticum  and  peregrinum.  In  every  part  of  the 
extensive  Roman  empire,  except  where  Greek  prevailed,  through 
the  skill  of  the  Roman  government  the  tongue  of  Latium  became 
current;  and  here  again  the  lingua  urbana  was  everywhere  the 
speech  of  the  educated.  Provincialisms  in  language  and  custom 
first  made  headway  in  the  time  of  the  decadence.    Then,  after  the 

11  Terence,  Andria  1.  30. 


128  AUGUST  BOECKH 

fall  of  the  Western  Empire,  the  Romance  languages  were  formed, 
not  from  the  literary  language,  but  from  the  lingua  rustica  as 
modified  in  the  several  provinces.  Thus  the  varieties  of  Roman 
civilization  according  to  nationalities  acquired  no  historical  signifi- 
cance until  the  birth  of  the  peoples  of  modern  Europe. 

Accordingly,  the  main  differences  to  be  observed  in  the  Roman 
character  in  the  order  of  time  lay  simply  in  its  different  relations 
to  Greek  culture.  The  first  period  was  the  Italic-Etruscan,  in  which 
the  ancient  national  civilization  prevailed,  and  which  came  down 
to  the  end  of  the  first  Punic  war.  Here  the  Etruscan  influence  was 
at  first  most  powerful,  and  then  gradually  decreased.  "With  the 
second  Punic  war  began  the  period  of  Graeco-Latin  civilization : 

In  the  second  Punic  war  did  the  Muse  with  pinioned  flight 
Speed  to  Romulus'  rude  race,  who  in  warfare  take  delight.12 

In  this  period  the  real  nature  of  Rome  most  truly  flourished;  the 
virtus  Romana  was  married  to  genuine  Roman  eloquence,  and 
poetry  enjoyed  relatively  its  greatest  independence  and  vigor.  But 
the  Greek  influence  steadily  gained  at  the  expense  of  what  was 
distinctively  Roman.  The  third  period  embraced  the  golden  and 
silver  ages  of  Latin  literature.  From  then  on,  after  the  State  had 
been  subjugated  to  the  autocracy  through  bloody  civil  wars,  Roman 
culture  was  wholly  occupied  in  imitating  Greek;  from  the  over- 
refined  form  the  ancient  national  vigor  disappeared.  And  then, 
after  the  time  of  the  Antonines,  complete  decay  set  in. 

Taken  as  a  whole,  the  history  of  mankind  represents  the  universal 
unfolding  of  the  powers  implanted  in  the  human  spirit.  Spirit, 
whose  essence  is  cognition  and  that  moral  will  which  is  founded 
upon  knowledge,  operates  only  in  connection  with  the  vegetative 
and  animal  functions;  and  corresponding  to  the  favorable  or  un- 
favorable influence  of  these,  the  capacity  for  cognition  is  extremely 
variable.  In  sleep,  where  the  animal  functions  of  sensation  and 
movement  are  at  rest,  we  see  cognition  reduced  to  a  minimum, 
since  consciousness  lives  only  in  the  imaginative  creations  of  dream- 
ing. In  the  child  we  see  cognition  begin  with  the  feeblest  efforts, 
because  the  vegetative  functions,  whose  end  is  the  preservation  and 

[12  Porcius  Licinius,  in  Gellius  17.  21.  44-45.  The  translation  of  the  two  lines 
is  adapted  from  that  in  A  Literary  History  of  Rome  by  J.  Wight  Duff,  p.  119. — 
Editor.] 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  129 

development  of  the  organism,  entirely  occupy  the  feeble  conscious- 
ness. But  even  as  its  strength  increases,  this  consciousness,  in 
waking  hours,  can  be  wholly  absorbed  in  sensory  images,  and  at  the 
same  time  desire  can  be  completely  determined  by  them.  This 
was  the  level  on  which  the  human  spirit  stood  in  the  earliest  Orien- 
tal period,  which  one  may  describe  as  the  vegetative  and  dreaming 
age  in  the  life  of  man.  At  this  stage  cognition  and  the  moral  will 
operated  without  any  consciousness  on  man's  part  that  they  were 
active ;  that  is,  they  operated  after  the  fashion  of  a  natural  impulse. 
But  the  impulse  was  the  instinct  of  reason,  which,  before  reason 
attained  to  self-consciousness,  in  prehistoric  ages  slowly  accom- 
plished the  most  difficult  steps,  herein  performing,  as  it  were, 
miracles.  Although  the  cognition  of  the  Eastern  peoples  remained 
prisoner  in  a  twilight  of  mythical  imagination,  they  nevertheless 
produced  the  germs  of  all  knowledge  respecting  God,  nature,  and 
mankind;  and  their  artistic  impulse  found  expression  in  works  of 
power  and  admirable  technique.  But  civilization  itself,  conjoined 
with  the  luxuriance  of  nature,  exercised  an  enervating  influence 
upon  those  races.  They  lost  moral  energy,  and  hence  could  not 
rouse  themselves  to  free  and  conscious  action.  Their  very  cognition 
was  stifled  by  a  riotous  imagination,  so  that  art  and  science,  while 
they  had  their  beginnings  in  the  East,  never  throve  there  to  the 
point  of  classic  perfection.  Yet  the  several  Eastern  races  ap- 
proached in  different  degrees  the  height  of  spiritual  freedom 
attained  by  the  Greeks.  The  barbarians  of  the  West  developed  in 
the  opposite  direction.  Their  energy  was  steeled  by  war  and  priva- 
tion ;  but  they  built  up  no  civilization,  because  with  them  the  intel- 
lectual life  lagged  behind  the  powerful  activity  of  an  unfettered 
animal  nature.  More  than  one  stock  thus  degenerated  to  complete 
brutality.  Others — in  particular  the  Germanic  peoples — preserved 
the  treasure  of  primitive  mythical  cognition  inherited  from  their 
aboriginal  home  in  the  East,  and  with  it  moral  will-power.  Like 
the  Greeks  of  the  heroic  age,  they  acted  according  to  the  wild 
impulses  in  their  hearts,  but  a  deep  religious  spirit  without  com- 
pulsion held  their  passions  within  certain  limits.  Between  the  two 
extremes  of  the  Eastern  civilized  nations  and  the  Western  natural 
races,  the  Greeks  and  Romans  constituted  the  mean,  spiritually  as 
well  as  geographically.  And  since  with  them  the  energy  that 
raises  man  above  the  vegetative  life  was  joined  to  a  constructive 
mind  and  artistic  impulse  that  prevent  him  from  sinking  to  the 
life  of  a  beast,  spirit  here  attained  to  the  stage  of  complete  human- 


130  AUGUST  BOECKH 

ity.    This  position  of  the  classic  culture  of  antiquity  was  properly 
indicated  in  their  time  by  Plato13  and  Aristotle.14 

When  the  ancient  world  had  fulfilled  its  own  true  nature,  and, 
surpassing  and  transcending  itself,  cast  forth  in  germ  the  forms  of 
a  new  culture,  the  seed  again  was  brought  to  maturity  through  the 
union  of  Oriental  profundity  and  Occidental  energy.  In  a  small, 
despised,  and  subjugated  people  of  the  Orient,  under  the  influence 
of  Greek  speculation,  Christianity  arose,  whose  function  it  was  to 
make  the  consciousness  of  the  nations  soar  to  the  supersensuous, 
and  to  tear  the  spirit  free  from  its  roots  in  the  life  of  nature.  The 
Roman  world-supremacy  had  prepared  the  way  for  the  spread  of 
the  world-religion ;  but  this  religion  was  itself  involved  in  the  cor- 
ruption of  a  falling  civilization,  and  bore  its  part  in  the  destruction 
of  pagan  art  and  science.  Yet  precisely  in  its  disfigurement  Chris- 
tianity found  easier  access  to  the  Germanic  peoples,  mollifying 
their  hardy  independence,  and  thus  making  them  capable  of  pro- 
ducing a  new  civilization.  In  the  Middle  Ages  were  laid  the  foun- 
dations of  all  modern  culture.  So  far  as  the  barbarity  of  the 
nations  and  the  ignorance  of  the  clergy  allowed,  public  and  private 
life  were  permeated  by  the  Christian  spirit.  Christian  art  bore 
splendid  fruit ;  and  science,  in  spite  of  pressure  from  the  hierarchy, 
finally  led  to  free  investigation,  which  in  the  fifteenth  century, 
assisted  by  truly  providential  events,  gave  the  impulse  to  the  devel- 
opment of  modern  times.  These  began  when  the  experimental 
sciences  were  founded  wholly  anew.  In  this  way,  as  time  went  on, 
speculation  was  purified,  being  relieved  by  natural  science  and 
history  of  many  false  assumptions  upon  which  it  had  rested  in 
antiquity,  and  still  more  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Along  with  this, 
Christianity  itself  experienced  after  the  Reformation  a  progressive 
scientific  rectification;  and  under  the  constant  influence  of  free 
investigation  the  true  consequences  of  the  Christian  view  of  life 
became  more  and  more  active  in  art,  society,  and  the  State.  At 
present  we  are  still  in  the  midst  of  this  movement,  and  cannot 
survey  its  further  course  in  advance.  But  the  ideal  of  the  future 
can  only  be  a  civilization  which  shall  take  up  into  itself  the  genuine 
elements  of  antiquity.  Spiritual  freedom  cannot  consist  in  such 
a  striving  after  the  supersensuous  as  shall  turn  us  away  like 
enemies  from  nature.  Rather  must  spirit  penetrate  into  the  laws 
of  nature  in  order  to  subdue  her ;  and  the  life  of  reason  cannot  be 
unnatural  or  opposed  to  nature.     Accordingly,  the  harmonious 

is  Plato,  Republic  4.  435E. 
«  Aristotle,  Politics  7.  7. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ANTIQUITY  131 

individual  culture  of  the  ancients  will  always  remain  for  us  a 
glorious  prototype;  for  the  universality  of  modern  times  has  life 
and  strength  only  when  the  particular  is  not  effaced  by  the  general, 
but  elevated  and  idealized  by  it.  And  so,  in  general,  the  problem 
is  to  reconcile  and  compose  all  that  is  at  variance  in  ancient  and 
modern  culture. 


X 

FATE  AND  FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  x 
By  Abby  Leach 

To  the  minds  of  the  many,  emphatic  iteration  and  reiteration  of 
a  statement  have  all  the  force  of  truth;  for  people  in  general  are 
prone  to  avoid  the  trouble,  exertion,  and  close  thinking  that  result 
in  logical  conclusions,  and  take  instead  the  easier  course  of  accept- 
ing ready-made  opinions.  When  a  popular  belief,  however  at 
variance  with  fact,  has  thus  become  fairly  established,  being 
asserted  many  times  by  many  writers,2  to  dislodge  it  is  no  easy  task ; 
and  there  may  be  difficulty  even  when  we  have  to  do  with  so  evident 
a  perversion  of  the  truth  as  the  widespread  notion  that  the  Greeks 
were  fatalists. 

What  do  we  mean  by  fatalism  ?  We  mean  that  man  is  not  master 
of  his  fate,  but  that  his  fate  masters  him — that,  do  what  he  may, 
he  cannot  escape  his  destiny.  Fate  is  irresistible,  unconquerable; 
and  its  decrees  are  absolute.  The  Turk  is  a  fatalist;  he  goes  into 
battle  with  the  conviction  that,  if  death  is  to  be  his  portion,  be  he 
brave  man  or  coward,  death  will  come  all  the  same.  For  him,  this 
fatalism  is  brightened  and  cheered  by  a  hope  which  is  an  incentive 
to  deeds  of  daring,  for  he  believes  that  if  he  meets  his  doom  with 
heroic  valor,  he  will  be  amply  rewarded  in  the  world  to  come;  in 
itself,  however,  the  doctrine  tends  to  inaction  and  despair.  Of 
Napoleon  the  Third  as  a  fatalist,  Zola  has  given  a  wonderful  por- 

[i  This  article,  which  first  appeared  with  the  title,  Fatalism  of  the  Greeks, 
in  the  American  Journal  of  Philology  36.  373-401,  is  reprinted  with  the  consent 
of  the  editor  of  that  journal,  Dr.  Gildersleeve.  The  author,  Miss  Leach,  is 
Professor  of  Greek  in  Vassar  College.  With  her  kind  permission,  certain 
changes  have  been  made  in  the  selection  so  as  to  bring  it  into  conformity  with 
the  rest  of  the  present  volume.  In  particular,  numerical  references  have  been 
relegated  to  the  footnotes,  and  passages  in  Greek  replaced  by  English.  Here 
and  there,  the  material  has  been  slightly  condensed  or  abridged. — Editor.] 

[2  Compare,  for  example,  Moulton,  The  Ancient  Classical  Drama  (1898), 
p.  93:  'Destiny  is  the  main  idea  inspiring  Ancient  Drama;  whatever  may  have 
been  the  religion  of  Greek  life,  the  religion  reflected  in  Greek  Tragedy  is  the 
worship  of  Destiny.' — Editor.] 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  133 

trayal  in  The  Downfall.  Whether  Zola  represents  Napoleon  truth- 
fully or  not  is  beside  the  point ;  what  concerns  us  is  the  description 
of  a  fatalist  in  the  person  of  the  hero.  Take  the  passage  where  the 
Emperor  presents  himself  on  the  battlefield :  '  Entirely  unattended, 
he  rode  forward  into  the  midst  of  the  storm  of  shot  and  shell, 
calmly,  unhurriedly,  with  his  unvarying  air  of  resigned  indiffer- 
ence, the  air  of  one  who  goes  to  meet  his  appointed  fate.  .  .  .  He 
rode  forward,  controlling  his  charger  to  a  slow  walk.  For  the  space 
of  a  hundred  yards  he  thus  rode  forward,  then  halted,  awaiting  the 
death  he  had  come  there  to  seek.  The  bullets  sang  in  concert  with 
a  music  like  the  fierce  autumnal  blast;  a  shell  burst  in  front  of 
him  and  covered  him  with  earth.  He  maintained  his  attitude  of 
patient  waiting.  His  steed,  with  distended  eyes  and  quivering 
frame,  instinctively  recoiled  before  the  grim  presence  who  was 
so  close  at  hand  and  yet  refused  to  smite  horse  or  rider.  At  last 
the  trying  experience  came  to  an  end,  and  the  Emperor,  with  his 
stoic  fatalism,  understanding  that  his  time  was  not  yet  come, 
tranquilly  retraced  his  steps.'3 

G.  H.  Lewes  thus  defines  fatalism :  '  Fatalism  says  that  some- 
thing must  be;  and  this  something  cannot  be  modified  by  any 
modification  of  the  conditions.'4 

The  Century  Dictionary  says:  'Fatalism  .  .  .  does  not  recognize 
the  determination  of  all  events  by  causes,  in  the  ordinary  sense; 
holding,  on  the  contrary,  that  a  certain  foreordained  result  will 
come  about,  no  matter  what  may  be  done  to  prevent  it. ' 

John  Stuart  Mill  thus  writes  on  the  subject:  'A  fatalist  believes, 
or  half  believes  (for  nobody  is  a  consistent  fatalist),  not  only  that 
whatever  is  about  to  happen  will  be  the  infallible  result  of  the 
causes  which  produce  it,  .  .  .  but,  moreover,  that  there  is  no  use 
in  struggling  against  it,  that  it  will  happen  however  we  may  strive 
to  prevent  it.'5 

The  natural  outcome  is  as  Milman  has  described  it :  'It  was  vain 
to  resist  the  wrath  of  God ;  and  so  a  wretched  fatalism  bowed  to  a 
more  utter  prostration  the  cowed  and  spiritless  race.'6 

Fatalism  benumbs  and  paralyzes  the  will,  until  apathy  and  stoical 
submission  are  the  only  resource.  To  accept  the  inevitable  without 
a  murmur,  with  passionless  calm  to  wrap  one 's  mantle  around  one- 
self, and  with  bowed  head  to  say  impassively:  'Kismet' — 'It  is 

a  Zola,  The  Downfall  {La  DSb&cle),  Part  2,  Ch.  1. 

*  Lewes,  Problems  of  Life  and  Mind  (Boston,  1880)  1.  284. 
5  Mill,  A  System  of  Logic  (1872)  2.  425. 

•  Milman,  History  of  Latin  Christianity  5.  9. 


134  ABBY  LEACH 

ordered' — this  is  fatalism,   and  this  is  what  a  fatalistic   belief 
engenders. 

That  so  deadening  a  doctrine  as  this  can  be  attributed  to  a  people 
like  the  Greeks  seems  more  than  strange.  When  we  look  at  the 
Hellenes,  and  especially  the  Athenians — for  Athens  represented 
to  Hellas,  and  represents  to  us,  the  highest  reach  of  Greek  thought 
and  feeling — what  do  we  find  as  their  characteristics?  Are  they 
not  alertness  of  mind,  power  to  make  independent  judgments,  a 
spirit  of  adventure  and  unresting  activity,  a  proud  self-confidence 
that  made  them  dare  and  do  what  seemed  impossible,  and  a  courage 
buoyant  after  direst  disaster?  "We  turn  to  the  matchless  descrip- 
tion given  by  Thucydides  in  what  purports  to  be  the  funeral  ora- 
tion of  Pericles  over  those  who  had  fallen  in  battle  in  the  first  year 
of  the  Poloponnesian  war : 

'  The  great  impediment  to  action  is,  in  our  opinion,  not  discussion, 
but  the  want  of  that  knowledge  which  is  gained  by  discussion  pre- 
paratory to  action;  for  we  have  a  peculiar  power  of  thinking 
before  we  act,  and  of  acting,  too ;  whereas  other  men  are  courageous 
from  ignorance,  but  hesitate  upon  reflection.  And  they  are  surely 
to  be  esteemed  the  bravest  spirits,  who,  having  the  clearest  sense 
both  of  the  pains  and  pleasures  of  life,  do  not  on  that  account 
shrink  from  danger.'7  'We  have  compelled  every  land  and  every 
sea  to  open  a  path  for  our  valor,  and  have  everywhere  planted 
eternal  memorials  of  our  friendship  and  of  our  enmity.'8  'They 
resigned  to  hope  their  unknown  chance  of  happiness,  but  in  the 
face  of  death  they  resolved  to  rely  upon  themselves  alone.'9 

The  emphasis  here  is  upon  the  intelligent  calculation  that  entered 
into  Athenian  warfare.  The  deity  of  these  Greeks  is  Athena,  the 
goddess  of  wisdom  and  skill,  who  teaches  men  to  put  their  strength 
and  energy  at  the  service  of  intelligence,  to  plan  and  contrive,  to 
measure  dangers  and  resources,  and  to  count  the  cost,  not  rushing 
into  battle  in  blind  fury  or  with  the  desperation  of  those  who  feel 
themselves  driven  on  by  an  unswerving  doom.  To  anything  like 
fatalism  their  spirit  is  diametrically  opposed.  Connoting  untiring 
energy,  hopeful  courage,  belief  in  one's  own  powers,  confidence  in 
skill  and  foresight,  it  has  nothing  in  common  with  a  belief  that 
depresses  effort  and  darkens  the  soul,  giving  only  the  courage  of 
despair,  or  at  best  a  stoical  fortitude. 

i  Thucydides  2.  40.    Jowett  's  translation. 
« Ibid.  2.  41. 
» Ibid.  2.  42. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  135 

According  to  Simonides :  'It  was  due  to  the  valor  of  these  men 
that  smoke  did  not  go  up  to  heaven  from  the  burning  of  spacious 
Tegea.  Their  choice  was  to  leave  their  children  a  city  flourishing 
in  freedom,  and  to  lay  down  their  own  lives  in  the  front  of  the 
battle.  '10  That  is  the  Greek  note,  the  noble  choice  that  sets  life  at 
naught  against  the  priceless  treasure  of  freedom.  No  fatalism  is 
this,  surely. 

Demosthenes  in  his  matchless  speech  On  the  Crown,  after  accord- 
ing to  the  Athenians  of  other  days  the  high  praise  that  they  were 
willing  to  give  themselves  to  dangers  for  glory  and  honor,  adds: 
1  Choosing  what  was  noble  and  right,  for  all  men 's  lives  have  a  fixed 
limit  in  death,  even  if  they  should  shut  themselves  up  in  a  chamber 
and  keep  guard ;  but  good  men  ought  to  put  their  hand  to  all  that 
is  noble  on  every  occasion,  holding  before  themselves  as  a  shield 
the  hope  of  good,  and  to  bear  whatever  the  god  gives,  nobly. '"  How 
does  this  differ  from  what  we  should  say  ? — '  Do  what  is  right,  and 
leave  the  issue  with  God. '  Not  once  throughout  the  eloquent  speech 
is  there  a  word  of  a  fate  that  held  the  Athenians  in  its  firm  grip, 
and  relentlessly  doomed  them  to  defeat  and  overthrow.  Instead: 
'If  Thessaly  had  had  only  one  man,  and  Arcadia  one,  who  had 
adopted  the  same  policy  as  I,  none  of  the  Hellenes  on  the  further 
or  on  the  hither  side  of  Thermopylae  would  have  experienced  the 
present  evils,  but  all  would  have  dwelt  in  their  countries,  free  and 
autonomous,  in  perfect  fearlessness,  in  safety  and  happiness.  '12  Are 
these  the  words  of  a  man  who  believes  in  the  resistless  oncoming  of 
a  dread  doom? 

Again  he  speaks  even  more  plainly:  'The  man  who  feels  he  has 
been  born  only  for  his  parents  awaits  the  death  of  fate  and  the  nat- 
ural death,  but  he  who  feels  he  was  born  for  his  country  will  die  that 
he  may  not  see  her  suffer  slavery,  and  will  count  the  insults  and 
loss  of  honor  that  he  must  bear  in  an  enslaved  state  more  to  be 
feared  than  death.'18  In  other  words,  the  patriot  is  ready  to  sacri- 
fice his  life  on  the  altar  of  his  country's  need,  while  the  stay-at- 
home  will  not  risk  his  personal  safety  on  any  battlefields,  but  waits 
ingloriously  for  death,  which  comes  to  all,  to  come  even  to  him. 
In  no  way  are  we  made  to  feel  that  the  Athenians  were  foredoomed 
to  defeat,  being  but  puppets  in  the  iron  clutch  of  fate.  Instead, 
Demosthenes  portrays  in  vivid  speech  the  conditions  that  favored 

10  Simonides,  fr.  102  (Bergk). 

ii  Demosthenes,  On  the  Crown  18.  97. 

12  Ibid.  18.304. 

is  Ibid.  18.  205. 


136  ABBY  LEACH 

Philip  in  his  aggressions,  and  in  his  analysis  of  the  causes  that 
contributed  to  the  final  triumph  of  Macedonia  shows  himself  a 
statesman  of  the  keenest  insight. 

Of  Thucydides  Croiset  says :  '  First  of  all,  he  is  a  philosopher,  a 
man  who  believes  .  .  .  that  the  events  of  nature  are  brought  to 
pass  in  accordance  with  regular  laws  ...  If  he  speaks  of  fortune 
(tvxtj)  ,  nowhere  has  he  made  it  a  divinity.  It  signifies  for  him  only 
the  unforeseen  and  unknowable.  In  politics,  as  in  nature,  he  believes 
in  intelligible  causes,  purely  human,  which  need  to  be  discovered.  '14 

Even  in  the  Odyssey,  what  do  we  find?  In  the  First  Book, 
beginning  with  line  32:  'Lo,  now,  how  falsely  mortals  blame  the 
gods ;  for  they  say  evils  come  from  us,  whereas  they,  even  of  them- 
selves, have  woes  beyond  fate  ['contrary  to  fate,'  wrkp  p.6pov] 
through  their  own  follies. '  Then  Zeus  tells  how  he  had  sent  Hermes 
to  warn  Aegisthus  not  to  slay  Agamemnon  or  to  wed  Clytemnestra, 
lest  punishment  come  to  him  from  Orestes  later  on,  and  says  that 
it  was  because  Aegisthus  paid  no  heed,  though  the  warning  was 
given  by  Hermes  himself,  that  he  had  to  suffer  the  consequences.15 

In  the  Oedipus  at  Colonus  of  Sophocles,  a  direful  threat  is  pro- 
nounced by  Oedipus  upon  Polynices  if  he  should  make  the  intended 
attack  upon  Thebes,  and  Antigone  adds  her  plea: 

Turn  back  thy  host  to  Argos  with  all  speed, 
And  ruin  not  thyself  and  Thebes  as  well. 

Polynices  replies  to  his  sister: 

That  cannot  be.    How  could  I  lead  again 
An  army  that  has  seen  their  leader  quail  ? 

Seeing  that  she  pleads  in  vain,  Antigone  then  asks : 

Wilt  thou  then  bring  to  pass  his  prophecies, 
"Who  threatens  mutual  slaughter  to  you  both?16 

That  is,  Polynices,  having  the  power  of  choice,  willed  to  go,  and 
so  sealed  his  own  doom.    It  is  true  that  he  makes  the  charge : 

Of  this  I  hold  thy  Erinys  to  be  the  cause.17 

"Croiset,  An  Abridged  History  of  Greek  Literature  (tr.  Heffelbower),  pp. 
296,  297. 

is  Odyssey  1.  32-43. 

i6  Sophocles,  Oedipus  at  Colonus  1416-1425.     Storr's  translation. 

it  Ibid.  1299. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  137 

But  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  these  are  the  words  of  a  man  who  of 
his  own  volition  has  come  with  foreign  aid  against  his  native  city; 
and  Oedipus  on  his  part  heaps  the  bitterest  reproaches  upon  him  for 
his  cruel  lack  of  filial  feeling :  '  'Tis  thou  that  hast  brought  my  days 
to  this  anguish,  'tis  thou  that  hast  thrust  me  out;  to  thee  I  owe  it 
that  I  wander,  begging  my  daily  bread  from  strangers.  And,  had 
these  daughters  not  been  born  to  be  my  comfort,  verily  I  had  been 
dead,  for  aught  of  help  from  thee.  '18  With  this  compare  his  earlier 
reference  to  the  two  brothers:  'But  now,  moved  by  some  god,  and 
by  a  sinful  mind,  an  evil  rivalry  hath  seized  them.  '19 

Of  the  futility  of  warning,  and  even  of  sure  prophecy,  Hawthorne 
has  given  a  good  illustration  in  The  Prophetic  Pictures.  An  artist 
of  marvelous  insight  paints  the  portraits  of  two  young  people  who 
have  just  been  wedded,  and,  discerning  a  taint  of  madness  in  the 
young  man,  gives  it  subtle  expression  in  the  portrait.  The  bride 
detects  it,  and  is  filled  with  horror.  Years  pass,  and  the  artist  comes 
back  after  a  long  absence,  and  goes  to  this  house  to  see  his  pictures. 
Just  as  he  reaches  the  room,  a  tragedy  is  impending.  The  curtain 
over  the  portraits  has  been  drawn  aside,  and  before  them  stand 
the  hapless  pair,  the  man  in  his  frenzy  grasping  his  victim's  hair 
with  one  hand,  while  in  the  other  he  holds  an  uplifted  knife  to  slay 
her.  The  artist  interposes,  and  saves  her  life;  then  with  a  stern 
look  he  cries:  'Wretched  lady!  Did  I  not  warn  you?'  'You  did,' 
answers  Elinor  calmly.  'But — I  loved  him!'  'Is  there  not  a  deep 
moral  in  the  tale  ? '  continues  Hawthorne.  '  Could  the  result  of  one, 
or  all  our  deeds,  be  shadowed  forth  and  set  before  us — some  would 
call  it  Fate  and  hurry  onward — others  be  swept  along  by  their  pas- 
sionate desires — and  none  be  turned  aside  by  the  Prophetic  Pic- 
tures.' The  portentous  knowledge  of  the  oracle  does  not  save  the 
man;  as  with  Oedipus,  the  impulsive  nature  flashing  out  in  wrath 
brings  upon  him  the  very  doom  he  sought  to  escape.  Does  not  the 
Greek  drama,  in  its  treatment  of  oracles,  express  something  similar 
to  the  profound  truth  here  uttered  by  the  American  novelist? 

Take  the  Antigone  of  Sophocles.  Tiresias  earnestly  and  solemnly 
warns  Creon,  but  to  no  purpose.  Stubbornly  entrenched  in  his 
purpose,  the  king  will  not  heed,  but  insults  the  prophet  with  base 
suspicion,  and  brings  down  upon  himself  the  full  weight  of  woe. 
Too  late  he  sees  himself  in  the  true  light — his  own  self-will,  and  not 
Heaven,  the  agent  of  his  doom — and  over  his  dead  son  he  cries 
out  from  a  broken  heart : 

is  Sophocles,  Oedipus  at  Colonus  1362  ff.    Jebb  's  translation. 
i»  Ibid.  371. 


138  ABBY  LEACH 

'Woe  for  the  sins  of  a  darkened  soul,  stubborn  sins,  fraught 
with  death!  Ah,  ye  behold  us,  the  sire  who  hath  slain,  the  son 
who  hath  perished!  "Woe  is  me,  for  the  wretched  blindness  of 
my  counsels!  Alas,  my  son,  thou  hast  died  in  thy  youth,  by  a 
timeless  doom,  woe  is  me ! — thy  spirit  hath  fled — not  by  thy  folly, 
but  by  mine  own !  '20 

And  the  commonly  neutral  chorus,  which  had  found  its  voice  to 
condemn  Creon  with  the  words, 

'Lo,  yonder  the  King  himself  draws  near,  bearing  that  which 
tells  too  clear  a  tale — the  work  of  no  stranger 's  madness,  if  we  may 
say  it, — but  of  his  own  misdeeds,'21 

now  rejoins : 

'Ah  me,  how  all  too  late  thou  seemest  to  see  the  right!'22 

Finally,  at  the  woeful  news  of  his  queen's  death,  with  heart- 
rending cry  the  hapless  king  exclaims : 

'Ah  me,  this  guilt  can  never  be  fixed  on  any  other  of  mortal 
kind,  for  my  acquittal!  I,  even  I,  was  thy  slayer,  wretched  that 
I  am — I  own  the  truth.  Lead  me  away,  0  my  servants,  lead  me 
hence  with  all  speed,  whose  life  is  but  as  death !  '23 

But  what  of  the  great  ethical  teaching  of  the  Greek  drama?  Is 
not  such  a  function  inconceivable  if  a  Greek  play  is  merely  the 
spectacle  of  men  and  women  moving  like  automata  to  a  destined 
end  ?  In  the  Poetics,  Aristotle  says :  '  The  right  thing,  however,  is, 
in  the  characters,  just  as  in  the  incidents  of  the  play,  to  endeavor 
always  after  the  necessary  or  the  probable ;  so  that  whenever  such 
and  such  a  personage  says  or  does  such  and  such  a  thing,  it  shall 
be  the  probable  or  necessary  outcome  of  his  character ;  and  when- 
ever this  incident  follows  on  that,  it  shall  be  either  the  necessary 
or  the  probable  consequence  of  it.  '24  Conversely,  what  a  personage 
says  or  does,  reveals  a  certain  moral  purpose.  Thus,  it  is  because  of 
the  nobility  of  her  nature  that  Antigone  cannot  leave  her  dearly 

20  Sophocles,  Antigone  1261-1269.    Jebb's  translation. 

21  Ibid.  1257-1260. 

22  Ibid.  1270. 

23  Ibid.  1317-1325. 

2*  Poetics  1454  *  33-36,  Bywater's  edition,  p.  43. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  139 

loved  brother  to  be  a  wretched  outcast  in  the  world  below ;  unhesi- 
tatingly she  gives  him  burial,  well  knowing  though  she  does  that 
the  price  of  her  act  will  be  her  own  young  life.  There  is  no  fatalism 
in  her  unwavering  choice;  she  feels  in  her  heart  the  binding  con- 
straint of  those  unwritten  laws  '  that  are  not  of  to-day  or  yesterday, 
but  live  on  for  ever';25  and  so  she  will  obey  the  decree  of  no  man, 
even  an  all-powerful  king,  if  it  conflicts  with  them,  choosing  instead 
to  fulfil  the  sacred  obligations  prescribed  by  her  own  loving  heart. 
Character  interpreted  by  action  and  in  action — this  is  the  Greek 
drama;  and  out  of  the  far-reaching  consequences  of  acts  that  are 
the  logical  outcome  of  character,  its  structure  is  formed.  So  in  a 
single  house  we  see  crime  followed  by  crime  and  punishment  by 
punishment,  as  in  that  of  the  ill-fated  Atridae,  until  at  last  comes 
one  pure  and  undefined  to  do  the  god 's  behest  and  so  stay  the  curse ; 
but  always  the  beginning  of  the  evil  is  in  the  sin  of  one  man. 
Laius  sins  through  his  passion  for  Chrysippus,  and  receives  as  his 
punishment  the  sentence  of  childlessless.26  But  though  warned  of 
his  doom  if  he  beget  a  child,  he  forgets  the  oracle  when  inflamed  by 
passion  and  flushed  with  wine.  He  then  tries  to  prevent  the  ful- 
filment of  the  prophecy  by  exposing  the  hapless  Oedipus ;  but  such 
an  attempt  is  now  folly,  and  Oedipus  fulfils  the  oracle  by  slaying 
his  father  where  the  three  roads  meet,  on  the  way  to  Delphi.  This  is 
not  fatalism,  however.  Laius  was  forewarned,  but  disobeyed  the 
warning.  Is  this  not  one  of  the  great  truths  of  life  ?  Do  we  not 
know — know  to  a  certainty — the  outcome  of  such  and  such  an  act, 
and  yet  perform  that  act,  hoping  in  some  vague  way  to  contrive  an 
escape  from  the  consequences?  And  so,  'the  fate  that  overtakes 
the  hero  is  no  alien  thing,  but  his  own  self  recoiling  upon  him  for 
good  or  evil.'27  That  'A  man's  character  is  his  destiny'  (t/flos 
avQpur/rw  SaifAUiv) ,  as  Heraclitus  says,  is  a  principle  clearly  recognized 
indeed  by  the  Greek  drama ;  but  nowhere  do  we  find  this  principle 
better  illustrated  than  in  the  English  tragedy  of  King  Lear,  who 
pays  for  his  folly  as  inexorably  as  any  character  in  any  Greek  play. 
Among  those  who  maintain  that  the  Greek  drama  was  a  drama 
of  destiny  is  De  Quincey.  'Man,'  he  says,  'no  longer  the  represen- 
tative of  an  august  will — man,  the  passion-puppet  of  fate — could 
not  with  any  effect  display  what  we  call  a  character.  .  .  .  The  will 
is  the  central  pivot  of  character;  and  this  was  obliterated, 
thwarted,  canceled,  by  the  dark  fatalism  which  brooded  over  the 

25  Antigone  456-457. 

2«  Cf.  Euripides,  Phoenissae  16-25. 

27  S.  H.  Butcher,  Aristotle's  Theory  of  Poetry  and  Fine  Art  (1907),  p.  355. 


140  ABBY  LEACH 

Grecian  stage.  .  .  .  Powerful  and  elaborate  character  .  .  .  would 
have  interrupted  the  blind  agencies  of  fate.  '28 

Butcher  replies :  '  It  is  strange  that  the  Greeks  of  all  people,  and 
Aeschylus  of  all  poets,  should  have  been  accused  of  depriving  man 
of  free  agency  and  making  him  the  victim  of  a  blind  fate.  The 
central  lesson  of  the  Aeschylean  drama  is  that  man  is  the  master 
of  his  own  destiny:  nowhere  is  his  spiritual  freedom  more  vigor- 
ously asserted.  The  retribution  which  overtakes  him  is  not  inflicted 
at  the  hands  of  cruel  or  jealous  powers.  It  is  the  justice  of  the 
gods,  who  punish  him  for  rebellion  against  their  laws.'29 

Pindar  has  the  same  moral  code./  Prosperity  engenders  pride, 
pride  lifts  up  a  man's  heart  within  him  to  commit  sin,  and  sin 
brings  punishment.  I  The  genealogy  is  o\j3o<s)  nopos,  v/3pis,  arr}:  pros- 
perity, satiety,  insolence,  vengeance.  '  The  prosperity  that  produces 
pride  and  fullness  of  bread  culminates  in  overweening  insolence  and 
outrage,  and  brings  on  itself  mischief  sent  from  heaven,'  as  Pro- 
fessor Gildersleeve  phrases  it  in  his  edition  of  Pindar.30  'If  ever 
the  watchers  of  Olympus  honored  any  man, '  says  Pindar,  '  that  man 
was  Tantalus.  But  the  high  honor  of  friendly  intercourse  with  the 
gods  proved  too  much  for  Tantalus.  He  grasped  after  more  than 
mortal  might,  and  so  brought  down  upon  himself  unmeasured 
woe.'31  In  similar  strain  Bacchylides  denounces  v/3pis:  'Inso- 
lence .  .  .  who  swiftly  gives  a  man  his  neighbor's  wealth  and 
power,  but  anon  plunges  him  into  a  gulf  of  ruin, — she  it  was  who 
destroyed  the  giants,  overweening  sons  of  earth.'32  Excess  the 
Greeks  condemned  and  deplored.  Their  cardinal  virtue  was 
(rw<f>poa~6vrj  ('measure,'  'moderation'),  and  they  rang  the  changes  on 
firj&v  ayav  ('nothing  too  much,'  'the  golden  mean').  Consciously 
or  unconsciously,  they  made  this  the  canon  of  their  art  and  litera- 
ture, and  so  they  wrought  the  perfect  work.  In  line  with  <ro><f>po<rvvr} 
is  the  oft-repeated  injunction  to  remember  that  we  are  mortals 
and  cannot  venture  too  far.  'Seek  not  to  become  Zeus';  'mortal 
things  befit  mortals ' ;  '  the  brazen  heavens  are  not  to  be  mounted.  '38 
True,  Aristotle  reaches  a  loftier  note :  '  Let  us  not  listen  therefore  to 

28  De  Quincey,  Shakespeare.  The  Collected  Works  of  Thomas  Be  Quincey, 
ed.  Masson  (1897),  4.  74-75. 

29  Butcher,  Aristotle 's  Theory  of  Poetry  and  Fine  Art,  pp.  356-357.  Compare 
Aeschylus,  Agamemnon  750-781. 

so  Gildersleeve,  Pindar:  the  Olympian  and  Pythian  Odes.  Introductory 
Essay,  p.  xxxi. 

si  Pindar,  0.  1.54-57. 

32  Bacchylides  14  [15].  59  ff.    Jebb's  translation. 

38  Pindar,  I.  5. 14;  I.  5. 16;  P.  10.  27. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  141 

those  who  tell  us  that,  as  men  and  mortals,  we  should  mind  only  the 
things  of  man  and  mortality ;  but,  so  far  as  we  may,  we  should  bear 
ourselves  as  immortals,  and  do  all  that  in  us  lies  to  live  in  accord 
with  that  element  within  us,  that  sovereign  principle  of  reason, 
which  is  our  true  self,  and  which  in  capacity  and  dignity  stands 
supreme.'34  Yet  Aristotle  defines  virtue  as  the  mean  between  the 
two  extremes  of  excess  and  deficiency,  and  condemns  alike  the  too 
much  and  the  too  little.  Courage  is  a  virtue ;  it  is  the  mean  between 
the  extremes  of  rashness  and  cowardice,  which  are  both  vices. 
'Pride  goeth  before  a  fall,'  is  the  teaching  of  Herodotus.  'He 
believes  in  the  existence  of  a  law  governing  events.  .  .  .  Every 
sin  draws  upon  man  a  punishment,  but,  above  all,  pride,  which  is 
the  unpardonable  sin.  The  defeats  of  Xerxes  have  no  other  cause 
but  this.'35  Bury  says  that  the  Persian  overthrow  according  to 
Herodotus  is  'a  divine  punishment  of  the  insolence  and  rashness 
that  are  often  born  of  prosperity.'36  The  Greek  dramatists,  too, 
show  presumptuous  pride  ( vfipis )  punished,  and  heavily  punished, 
by  the  gods.  Ajax,  the  bravest  of  the  Greeks  after  Achilles,  over- 
confident in  his  strength  and  bravery,  dares  to  set  the  gods  at 
naught ;  and  this  presumption  Sophocles  makes  the  central  thought 
in  his  play  of  that  name : 

'  ' '  Yea, ' '  said  the  seer, ' '  lives  that  have  waxed  too  proud,  and  avail 
for  good  no  more,  are  struck  down  by  heavy  misfortunes  from  the 
gods,  as  often  as  one  born  to  man's  estate  forgets  it  in  thoughts  too 
high  for  man.  But  Ajax,  even  at  his  first  going  forth  from  home, 
was  found  foolish,  when  his  sire  spake  well.  His  father  said  unto 
him:  'My  son,  seek  victory  in  arms,  but  seek  it  ever  with  the  help 
of  heaven.'  Then  haughtily  and  foolishly  he  answered:  'Father, 
with  the  help  of  gods  e  'en  a  man  of  naught  might  win  the  mastery ; 
but  I,  even  without  their  aid,  trust  to  bring  that  glory  within  my 
grasp.'  So  proud  was  his  vaunt.  Then  once  again,  in  answer  to 
divine  Athena, — when  she  was  urging  him  onward  and  bidding 
him  turn  a  deadly  hand  upon  his  foes — in  that  hour  he  uttered  a 
speech  too  dread  for  mortal  lips:  'Queen,  stand  thou  beside  the 
other  Greeks ;  where  Ajax  stands,  battle  will  never  break  our  line. ' 
By  such  words  it  was  that  he  brought  upon  him  the  appalling 
anger  of  the  goddess,  since  his  thoughts  were  too  great  for  man. ' '  '3T 

3*  Aristotle,  Nicomachean  Ethics  10.  7. 

35  Croiset,  Manuel  d'Histoire  de  la  LittSrature  Grecque,  p.  393  (cf.  the  same 
authors'  Abridged  History  of  Greek  Literature,  tr.  Heffelbower,  p.  270). 
8«  Bury,  The  Ancient  Greek  Historians,  p.  68. 
37  Sophocles,  Ajax  758-777.    Jebb's  translation. 


142  ABBY  LEACH 

And  to  Odysseus  Athena  speaks  the  clearest  words  of  warning  be- 
cause of  the  wretchedness  and  disgrace  Ajax  has  brought  upon 
himself : 

'Therefore,  beholding  such  things,  look  that  thine  own  lips 
never  speak  a  haughty  word  against  the  gods,  and  assume  no 
swelling  port,  if  thou  prevailest  above  another  in  prowess  or  by 
store  of  ample  wealth;  for  a  day  can  humble  all  human  things,  and 
a  day  can  lift  them  up ;  but  the  wise  of  heart  are  loved  of  the  gods, 
and  the  evil  are  abhorred.  '38 

But  though  Ajax  deserves  his  fate  at  the  hands  of  Athena,  yet 
the  poet,  in  meting  out  to  him  the  doom  his  haughty  pride  has 
brought  upon  him,  has  not  failed  to  set  forth  most  beautifully  the 
other  side  of  his  nature;  so  that,  with  mingled  emotions  of  pity, 
admiration,  and  blame,  we  mourn  the  sad  end  of  one  who,  with  all 
his  faults,  still  was  a  man  cast  in  heroic  mould.  But  this  only 
illustrates  what  Aristotle  meant  by  putting  the  emotions  of  pity  and 
fear  in  the  forefront  of  tragedy,  and  maintaining  that  by  the  inter- 
play of  these  the  most  tragic  effects  are  produced.  The  haughty 
pride  and  fierce  resentment  of  the  hero,  his  murderous  onslaught 
foiled  by  Athena,  his  ungovernable  nature  that  cannot  brook  with 
patience  a  wrong,  his  terrible  humiliation,  all  fill  us  with  awe  and 
fear.  In  him  we  see  portrayed  human  nature  in  its  pride  and 
arrogance  calling  down  upon  itself,  in  its  own  act,  utter  ruin.  On 
the  other  hand,  our  hearts  are  filled  with  pity  at  the  injustice  dealt 
out  to  him  which  has  embittered  his  soul,  at  the  moving  spectacle 
of  this  mighty  man  of  valor  brought  thus  low,  at  his  deep  sense 
of  shame  and  his  pathetic  resolve  not  to  survive  his  disgrace.  And 
there  are  other  figures  on  the  canvas :  the  narrow-minded  Menelaus, 
with  his  angry  resentment  and  hatred;  the  loving  Tecmessa,  with 
her  tender  and  unselfish  devotion ;  the  magnanimous  Odysseus,  who 
sees  beyond  the  limits  of  his  own  feelings  into  the  great  truths  of 
human  experience;  and  the  blunt,  loyal  Teucer,  who  makes  his 
brother's  cause  his  own. 

It  is  strange  that  any  one  should  have  made  the  word  'classic' 
synonymous  with  something  cold  and  formal.  Greek  drama  is  all 
aglow  with  life  and  feeling ;  the  men  and  women  have  like  passions 
with  ourselves;  the  red  blood  courses  through  their  arteries;  their 
pulses  are  set  throbbing  with  the  emotions  that  sweep  over  their 
souls ;  and  because  they  make  real  to  us  the  passion  of  grief  and  the 

as  Sophocles,  Ajax  127-133. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  143 

agony  of  distress  and  sorrow,  our  own  hearts  vibrate  in  sympathetic 
accord  with  their  every  mood.  In  these  wonderful  creations  of  the 
poet's  fancy,  we  see  before  us  real  people,  baffled  or  triumphant, 
suffering  or  rejoicing,  receiving  the  just  recompense  of  their  acts, 
with  righteousness  vindicated  and  wrong  punished.  The  Greek 
drama  makes  a  profound  appeal  to  human  feelings;  and  so  it  is 
ageless  for  ever;  for,  though  the  seasons  wax  and  wane,  and  the 
revolving  years  swiftly  roll  on  in  their  course,  year  giving  place  to 
year,  yet  human  nature  does  not  change,  and  always  the  poet  who 
knows  how  to  reach  its  deep  springs  has  lasting  power  to  charm  and 
delight.  The  Greek  imagination  was  greatly  stirred  by  the  sight 
of' greatness  brought  low,  of  a  king  in  the  moment  of  his  triumph 
struck  down,  of  great  prosperity  changed  in  the  twinkling  of  an 
eye  to  extreme  adversity.  The  vicissitudes  of  fortune,  the  brevity 
of  life,  the  insecurity  of  high  place  and  station — these  are  their 
constant  theme.  Not  man  doomed,  but  man  vital,  acting  with  pas- 
sion and  vigor,  loving  life  and  exulting  in  his  powers  and  strength, 
in  his  very  exuberance  of  life  and  joy  provoking  fortune  to  his 
undoing — this  is  what  the  Greeks  give  us  again  and  again.  Take 
Hippolytus,  whom  Euripides  has  portrayed  with  exquisite  charm. 
All  the  freshness  and  buoyancy  and  loveliness  of  youth  are  his 
while  his  pure  soul,  abhorring  all  that  is  evil,  worships  only  at  the 
shrine  of  the  virgin  goddess.  But  though  he  honors  with  every 
honor  his  beloved  Artemis,  from  Aphrodite  he  turns  away  in  scorn 
and  loathing,  and  is  punished  by  the  goddess  for  his  contemptuous 
neglect.  His  faithful  retainer,  wise  with  the  experience  of  years, 
utters  a  warning  word,  but  the  youth  is  too  confident  in  himself  to 
pay  any  heed.  It  is  an  altogether  human  document,  this  drama, 
though  gods  intervene  and  play  their  part  with  the  rest. 

Here,  again,  is  a  fertile  field  for  misconception.  It  must  be 
remembered  that  the  Greeks  lived  on  terms  of  familiar  intercourse 
with  their  gods  and  goddesses,  and  conceived  of  them  as  beings  like 
themselves,  only  moving  on  a  higher  plane,  and  greater  and  grander 
than  mortals  of  daily  life.  Then,  too,  the  Greeks  with  their  vivid 
personifying  power  create  a  divinity  of  major  or  minor  impor- 
tance for  all  that  we  see  or  feel.  So  with  them  Phaedra  is  the  victim 
of  Aphrodite,  where  we  should  say  that  she  was  under  the  spell  of 
a  mad  passion  for  Hippolytus,  or  was  infatuated  with  the  beautiful 
youth,  or  was  a  lovesick  queen,  or  was  driven  to  distraction  by  the 
conflicting  emotions  in  her  soul.  Moreover,  the  Greek  divinities 
never  hold  themselves  far  aloof  from  mortals ;  they  sometimes  even 
fight  with  them  on  the  battlefield,  and  appear  to  them  in  visible 


144  ABBY  LEACH 

presence  to  advise  and  direct.  That  is  why  the  deus  ex  machina  in 
a  Greek  play  is  sometimes  so  far  from  what  it  is  represented  to  be, 
the  poet's  device  in  a  situation  that  has  become  too  complex  to  be 
solved  otherwise.  The  appearance  of  the  god  or  goddess  is  not 
alien  to  actual  experience — as  in  the  story  Herodotus  tells  of  Pan 
before  the  battle  of  Marathon;  and  the  final  word  spoken  by  a 
divinity  is  by  no  means  the  last  resort  of  a  poet  tangled  up  in  a 
plot  too  intricate  to  be  unraveled;  rather  it  gives  the  seal  and 
impress  of  divine  sanction  for  the  issue  desired,  and  the  word  of 
prophecy  for  the  happy  outcome  in  the  future.  Calm  after  storm, 
subsidence  of  emotion  into  a  sense  of  peace  and  harmony,  strife 
and  turmoil  followed  by  quiet  acquiescence  in  the  universal  law — 
this  is  the  rule  of  tragedy,  and  for  this  the  god  or  goddess  comes 
with  authority  that  cannot  be  gainsaid. 

Yet  the  Greeks  are  perfectly  consistent  no  more  than  we,  and  the 
Hippolytus  will  illustrate  their  somewhat  contradictory  views  as  to 
free  will  and  divine  agencies.  Phaedra  has  brooded  over  the  cause 
of  the  misery  in  the  lives  of  mortals,  and  her  conclusion  is  that 
'We  know  and  understand  the  good,  but  do  not  carry  it  out  in 
action,  some  from  sloth,  and  some  because  they  set  some  pleasure 
before  the  good, '  etc.39  She  is  admirably  portrayed.  Right-minded, 
holding  up  to  herself  right  standards,  but  weak  and  vacillating, 
she  is  ready  to  succumb  to  her  passion.  It  is  noteworthy  that  the 
god  or  goddess  who  influences  any  particular  character,  and  holds 
sway  over  him,  is  the  one  that  is  in  accord  with  his  own  nature. 
Phaedra  is  peculiarly  fitted  to  be  the  victim  of  Aphrodite,  and 
Hippolytus  has  the  chaste  Artemis  for  his  companion  and  the  object 
of  his  worship.  In  the  prologue,  Aphrodite  tells  how  she  will 
punish  the  chaste  but  haughty  Hippolytus  through  Phaedra;  yet 
throughout  the  play  we  forget  all  about  the  goddess,  so  vividly  do 
we  see  Phaedra  yielding  and  resisting,  ashamed  and  yet  secretly 
consenting  to  the  base  plan  of  her  loyal  nurse,  whom  she  covers 
with  reproaches  only  when  the  withering  scorn  of  Hippolytus  has 
burnt  into  her  soul.  Then  the  nurse  shrewdly,  and  a  little  bitterly, 
knowing  her  mistress  all  too  well,  replies :  '  If  I  had  succeeded,  then 
I  should  be  reckoned  with  the  wise,  for  our  wisdom  is  measured  by 
our  success.  '40    And  in  the  end,  when  Phaedra, 

ere  she  perished,  blasted  in  a  scroll 
The  fame  of  him  her  swerving  made  not  swerve,41 

39  Euripides,  Hippolytus  380  ff. 

40  Ibid.  700-701. 

4i  Browning,  Artemis  Prologizes  29-30. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  145 

there  is  no  mention  of  any  god  or  goddess.  Phaedra  herself,  and 
by  herself,  made  the  plan  and  executed  it.  Again,  when  Hippoly- 
tus  is  dying,  Artemis  does  say  that  the  Cyprian  willed  for  this  to 
happen,  in  order  to  fill  up  the  measure  of  her  wrath  for  his  haughty 
neglect  of  her  worship ;  but  she  condemns  Theseus  because  he 
destroyed  his  son  without  first  weighing  evidence,  or  consulting 
seers,  or  waiting  for  time  to  prove  or  disprove  the  baleful  charge. 

No  one  can  read  the  Greek  dramas  in  their  entirety  without  feel- 
ing that,  whatever  outside  forces  are  at  work,  whatever  the  inherit- 
ance may  be,  after  all,  man  is  a  free  agent,  who  makes  his  choice 
for  weal  or  woe — and  this  moral  responsibility  is  the  opposite  of 
fatalism.  Man  has  his  chance,  but  so  dull  is  he,  or  so  perverse, 
that  rarely  does  he  seize  the  golden  opportunity;  and  hence  the 
maxims,  yvS>$L  o-eaurov,  yvddi  Kaipov,  were  put  forth  by  the  Wise  Men 
of  Greece  as  the  primal  need  for  true  living:  'For  a  brief  span 
hath  opportunity  [  kcu/do's  ]  for  man,  but  of  him  it  is  known  surely 
when  it  cometh,  and  he  waiteth  thereon,  a  servant  but  no  slave.'42 
This  word,  kcuoo's,  Butcher  thus  defines:  'Time  charged  with  oppor- 
tunity; our  own  possession,  to  be  seized  and  vitalized  by  human 
energy ;  momentous,  effectual,  decisive ;  Time  the  inert  transformed 
into  purposeful  activity.'43  With  this  definition  compare  Sopho- 
cles: 


r 


For  opportunity  is  the  best  captain  of  all  enterprise.44 

Plato,  in  his  tale  of  Er,  in  which  he  represents  the  souls  choos- 
ing each  a  life  for  himself,  says  emphatically:  'The  responsibility 
is  with  the  chooser — God  is  blameless';45  but  once  the  choice  is 
made,  they  must  abide  by  it.  Plato  sounds  his  note  of  warning :  the 
most  earnest  study  and  thought  must  be  given  in  order  that  the 
choice  may  be  wise,  since  everything  is  involved  in  it.  Is  this 
fatalism  ?  Looking  at  life  as  we  see  it,  do  we  not  say  virtually  the 
same  thing? — 'Whatsoever  a  man  soweth,  that  shall  he  also  reap.' 
'  They  have  sown  the  wind,  and  they  shall  reap  the  whirlwind. '  Is 
it  not  the  law  of  life  that  to  us  has  been  entrusted  the  choice  in 
great  measure  of  what  our  lives  shall  be,  and  do  we  not  pay  the 
penalty  or  reap  the  reward  accordingly  ?  Perhaps  the  Greeks  press 
home  the  truth  more  strongly  than  we,  because  Christian  teaching 
emphasizes  the  possibility  of  reform  even  for  one  deeply  dyed  in 

42  Pindar,  P.  4.  286-288.    Myers '  translation. 

43  S.  H.  Butcher,  Harvard  Lectures  on  Greek  Subjects,  p.  119. 
<4  Sophocles,  Electro  75-76.    Storr's  translation. 

45  Plato,  Republic  10  (617E). 


146  ABBY  LEACH 

sin ;  yet  we  know  that  the  consequences  of  wrongdoing  are  inevit- 
able, and  that  no  repentance  or  change  of  conduct  will  make  the 
character  and  life  what  it  would  have  become  through  the  choice 
of  the  beautiful  and  good.  But  though  the  Greeks  emphasize  the 
punishment  that  waits  upon  sin  and  folly,  yet,  if  the  offense  is  not 
too  great,  there  comes  relief  from  the  punishment,  and  a  new 
chance.  In  the  seventh  Olympian  ode  of  Pindar  one  finds  the  Greek 
conception  of  life  clearly  expressed;  Nemesis  is  the  thing  dwelt 
upon,  not  fate.  Those  who  have  sinned,  who  have  forgotten,  who 
were  absent,  paid  the  penalty;  but,  even  so,  there  came  'sweet 
recompense  for  grievous  disaster.'  'Yet  the  Titans  were  set  free 
by  immortal  Zeus.'  'The  heavy  stone  that  from  the  hand  is 
hurled  we  cannot  check,  nor  word  that  leaves  the  tongue.'*6 

I  do  not  for  a  moment  deny  that  fate  and  fortune  play  a  part  in 
Greek  literature  and  life;  but  that  is  quite  different  from  saying 
that  the  Greeks  were  fatalists.  Even  where  some  god  or  goddess 
lays  a  heavy  hand  upon  a  hero,  as  upon  Heracles  in  the  Trachiniae 
of  Sophocles — Heracles,  the  type  of  the  man  of  toils  and  burdens — 
yet  after  all,  it  is  his  own  folly  that  destroys  him;  for  with  time, 
according  to  the  play,  he  would  have  had  release  from  his  relent- 
less taskmaster,  had  not  his  passion  for  Iole  worked  his  undoing. 
And  moreover,  his  patient  endurance  and  hard-won  conquests  are 
shown  in  the  Philoctetes  to  have  received  rich  reward  in  the  apotheo- 
sis of  the  hero. 

There  is  a  passage  in  the  Prometheus  of  Aeschylus  often  brought 
forward  to  prove  that  the  Greeks  held  fate  to  be  supreme  over  the 
gods — even  Zeus  himself, — and  cited  as  conclusive  evidence  'of  their 
fatalism.  In  this  play  Prometheus  says :  '  Fate,  the  all-f ulfiller,  has 
otherwise  decreed  the  end  of  these  things. '  The  Chorus  asks :  '  "Who 
then  holds  the  helm  of  necessity  ? '  Prometheus  replies :  '  The  triple 
Fates  and  the  mindful  Erinyes.'  'And  is  Zeus  weaker  than  these?' 
they  ask.  'Yes,'  Prometheus  answers,  'and  therefore  he  cannot 
escape  what  is  fated.'47  This  positive  statement  of  the  supremacy 
of  the  fates  is  the  more  remarkable,  because  elsewhere  Aeschylus 
exalts  the  power  of  Zeus  in  no  uncertain  terms  as  supreme.  To  cite 
a  few  passages  out  of  many,  in  the  Suppliants  we  have :  '  There  is 
no  o  'erstepping  the  mighty  impassable  will  of  Zeus.  '48  Again : '  And 
regard  thy  suppliants,  O  almighty  Zeus  that  swayest  the  earth!' 

*«  (1)  Pindar,  0.  7.77;  (2)  Pindar,  P.  4.291;  (3)  Menander,  Incert.  Fab. 
fr.  1092  (Kock). 

*7  Aeschylus,  Prometheus  Bound  511-518. 

*8  Aeschylus,  Suppliants  1016.    Tucker's  translation. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  147 

'Yet  thine  wholly  is  the  beam  of  the  balance,  and  without  thee  what 
eometh  to  pass  for  mortals  ?  '*9  '  King  of  Kings,  most  blessed  of  the 
blest,  and  most  absolute  of  absolute  powers,  all-happy  Zeus!'50 
Clearly  in  these  passages  there  is  no  subordination  of  Zeus  to  fate ; 
on  the  contrary,  he  is  represented  as  wielding  all  power,  the  supreme 
ruler  of  the  universe.  Can  we  reconcile  the  passage  in  the  Pro- 
metheus with  this?  In  the  first  place,  we  must  remember  that 
Prometheus,  who  says  these  words,  is  the  bitter  opponent  of  Zeus, 
stubborn  in  his  resistance,  implacable  in  his  resentment,  with  un- 
bending will  enduring  more  than  mortal  agony  rather  than  yield 
to  the  god's  authority.  His  haughty  defiance  kindles  our  admira- 
tion, even  though  the  poet  through  the  Chorus  shows  us  that  he  has 
sinned,  and  is  suffering  justly  for  his  deed,  however  proudly  he  may 
refuse  to  recognize  the  fact.  We  must  remember,  too,  that  this  is 
but  one  play  of  the  trilogy.  There  was  also  a  Prometheus  Unbound, 
of  which  only  a  few  fragments  have  come  down  to  us,  but  from 
these  we  find  that  in  the  end  Zeus  triumphs,  and  Prometheus  con- 
fesses his  sin.  Thereafter  he  takes  his  place  among  the  gods  of 
Olympus,  but  henceforth  he  wears  upon  his  brows  a  willow  wreath, 
the  token  of  repentance.51 

However,  I  am  far  from  saying  that  the  Greeks  were  consistent 
in  their  utterances  or  beliefs.  While  in  general  Zeus  is  exalted  to 
the  supreme  place,  sometimes  we  find  passages  that  seem  to  give 
predominance  to  fate ;  and  while  in  general  man  is  free  to  work  out 
his  own  destiny,  sometimes  there  is  a  doom  upon  him  which  he 
cannot  escape.52  But  do  we  not  see  precisely  this  in  life  ?  However 
we  may  explain  it,  do  we  not  sometimes  feel  the  futility  of  human 
endeavor  ?  Have  we  not  the  proverb :  '  Man  proposes,  but  God  dis- 
poses'?   And  Shakespeare  says: 

There's  a  divinity  that  shapes  our  ends, 
Rough-hew  them  how  we  will.53 

«»  Aeschylus,  Suppliants  815  ff.  Theognis  (157)  uses  the  same  figure:  'Zeus 
inclines  the  balance  now  one  way,  and  now  another. ' 

so  Ibid.  503  ff. 

6i  Athenaeus  15.  672E,  674D. 

52  Compare  Bacchylides  16.  24-28:  'Whatever  the  resistless  doom  given  by  the 
gods  has  decreed  for  us,  and  the  scale  of  Justice  inclines  to  ordain,  that 
appointed  fate  we  will  fulfil  when  it  comes.'  (Jebb's  translation.)  On  the  other 
hand,  see  Bacchylides  14.51-56:  'Zeus,  who  rules  on  high  and  beholds  all 
things,  is  not  the  author  of  grievous  woes  for  mortals.  No,  open  before  all 
men  is  the  path  that  leads  to  unswerving  Justice,  attendant  of  holy  Eunomia 
and  prudent  Themis.'     (Jebb's  translation.) 

58  Shakespeare,  Hamlet  5.  2. 11. 


148  ABBY  LEACH 

And  again : 

What  fates  impose,  that  men  must  needs  abide.84 

And: 

But  0  vain  boast,  who  can  control  his  fate?55 

Or  compare  Cowper : 

Fate  steals  along  with  silent  tread, 
Pound  oft 'nest  in  what  least  we  dread.56 

Have  we  not  wrestled  with  the  problem  of  almighty  power  and 
predestination,  God 's  foreknowledge  and  man 's  free  will  ?  But  we 
are  not  fatalists,  and  no  more  were  the  Greeks.  Take  the  story  of 
Pelops  as  Pindar  tells  it  in  the  first  Olympian  ode.  Enamored  of 
the  lovely  Hippodamia,  he  resolves  to  enter  the  lists  to  win  her, 
though  failure  will  be  certain  death.  Alone  in  the  darkness  he 
stands  upon  the  seashore,  and  invokes  the  aid  of  Posidon,  with 
whom  in  the  past  he  has  found  favor.  Knowing  full  well  the  peril — 
for  thirteen  suitors  already  have  been  slain — nevertheless,  with 
undaunted  courage  he  says:  'Forasmuch  as  men  must  die,  where- 
fore should  one  sit  vainly  in  the  dark  through  a  dull  and  nameless 
age,  without  lot  in  noble  deeds  ?  Not  so,  but  I  will  dare  this  strife. 
Do  thou  give  the  issue  I  desire.'57  The  gods  help  those  who  help 
themselves:  Posidon  grants  his  aid,  and  Hippodamia  is  won. 
Where  is  the  fatalism  in  this  story?  Pelops  has  determined  to 
hazard  his  life  for  the  prize  he  longs  for,  and  only  when  thus 
resolved  does  he  invoke  the  aid  of  the  god.  This  is  the  true  Greek 
spirit — daring  in  the  face  of  peril,  confidence  in  the  ability  to 
achieve  success,  and  love  of  glory  and  honor  and  deeds  that  bring 
fame — and  this  the  theme  of  poet  and  orator  as  well. 

'But  what  of  Oedipus?'  a  believer  in  the  fatalism  of  the  Greeks 
will  ask.  His  destiny  does  seem  to  have  been  marked  out  for  him, 
I  grant;  and  yet  Sophocles  plainly  shows  even  in  his  case  that  his 
own  traits  of  character  brought  on  and  augmented  the  catastrophe. 
Further,  this  play  is  but  one,  and  might  be  taken  to  illustrate  the 
emphasis  occasionally  put  upon  that  something  which  seems  to  defy 
forethought  and  calculation,  in  some  lives  bringing  disaster  upon 
disaster,  which  culminate  in  utter  ruin  in  spite  of  every  well-meant 

"  $  Henry  VI  4.  3.  57. 

55  Othello  5.  2.  264. 

56  Cowper,  A  Fable  36-37. 

57  Pindar,  0.  1.  82-85. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  149 

effort  to  avert  the  impending  woe.  But  to  the  Athenian  audience 
this  play  had  something  to  teach  quite  apart  from  the  truth  of 
prophecy  and  oracular  decree.  They  saw  in  it  the  lesson  that  was 
brought  home  to  them  again  and  again,  how  man  cannot  tread  his 
path  with  sure  self-confidence,  how  it  may  happen  that  in  his  very 
effort  to  save  himself  from  peril,  he  will  be  rushing  straight  on  to 
the  dreaded  evil.  The  play  is  a  wonderful  exponent  of  the  irony 
of  destiny,  and  abounds  in  dramatic  satire.  In  his  loyal  devotion 
to  the  State,  Oedipus  pronounces  an  awful  curse  upon  the  man  who 
has  murdered  Laius  and  now  pollutes  the  city  by  his  presence ;  little 
dreaming  that  he  is  the  guilty  man  himself,  and  that  it  is  upon  his 
own  head  that  he  is  calling  down  the  fearful  imprecation.  This  is 
what  wrought  upon  the  souls  of  the  Athenian  audience,  and  thrilled 
them  with  pity  and  fear — the  consciousness  of  man's  blindness  and 
ignorance,  the  possibility  that  the  seeming  good  may  be  evil;  for 
it  was  precisely  when  Oedipus  stood  forth  great  and  wise  before 
all  men,  on  the  very  pinnacle  of  power  and  honor,  that  the  crushing 
blow  came,  to  hurl  him  to  the  lowest  depths  of  misery.  But  though 
the  play  is  most  dramatic  in  conception,  and  most  dramatically 
worked  out  from  point  to  point,  it  is  often  misunderstood.  Many 
people  see  in  it  merely  the  fulfilment  of  the  oracle,  a  man  in  the  toils 
of  fate ;  and  that,  I  repeat,  is  not  what  quickened  the  imagination 
of  the  Greeks.  The  play  wrought  upon  their  thought  and  feeling 
because  it  so  forcibly  illustrated  the  painful  truth  that  great  power, 
high  station,  riches,  honor,  rest  on  no  secure  basis,  and  the  greater 
the  height  attained,  the  greater  may  be  the  fall.  As  Sophocles 
expresses  it  in  Philoctetes:  'Do  thou  save  me,  do  thou  show  me 
mercy — seeing  how  all  human  destiny  is  full  of  the  fear  and  the 
peril  that  good  fortune  may  be  followed  by  evil.  He  who  stands 
clear  of  trouble  should  beware  of  dangers;  and  when  a  man  lives 
at  ease,  then  it  is  that  he  should  look  most  closely  to  his  life,  lest 
ruin  come  on  it  by  stealth.  '58    Or  as  Shakespeare  puts  it : 

This  is  the  state  of  man :  to-day  he  puts  forth 
The  tender  leaves  of  hopes ;  to-morrow  blossoms, 
And  bears  his  blushing  honors  thick  upon  him ; 
The  third  day  comes  a  frost,  a  killing  frost; 
And,  when  he  thinks,  good  easy  man,  full  surely 
His  greatness  is  a-ripening,  nips  his  root, 
And  then  he  falls,  as  I  do.89 

68  Sophocles,  Philoctetes  501-506.     Jebb's  translation. 
"  Shakespeare,  Henry  VIII  3.  2.  353-359. 


150  ABBY  LEACH 

Moreover,  in  the  case  of  Oedipus,  we  must  not  forget  that  we  have 
a  contrast  of  the  opposite  kind  in  the  beautiful  play  of  Oedipus  at 
Colonus.  There  Oedipus  is  an  outcast  and  wanderer,  old  and  blind, 
to  all  men  most  pitiable;  but  it  is  then,  when  he  has  become 
chastened  and  humbled,  that  the  gods  lift  him  up,  and  give  to  him 
an  ending  of  life  glorious  almost  beyond  belief. 

A  few  years  ago  the  changes  were  rung  upon  heredity  and 
environment.  What  we  were  for  weal  or  woe,  for  good  or  evil, 
was  all  marked  out  for  us  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave,  and  we 
were  the  merest  automata,  with  no  more  volition  than  marionettes. 
But  in  spite  of  all  that  was  said,  and  learnedly  confirmed,  the  sober 
sense  of  people  rose  in  revolt ;  for  we  know  that  we  can  change  our 
inheritance,  that  we  can  rise  superior  to  circumstances,  that  there 
are  currents  and  cross-currents  in  life,  and  that  even  in  a  wretched 
environment  there  may  open  a  door  of  opportunity  and  success. 
Nevertheless,  heredity  and  environment  are  things  to  reckon  with, 
and  on  many  they  do  lay  a  heavy  hand.  The  family  stained  by  a 
great  crime,  the  family  with  evil  upon  evil  charged  to  its  account, 
does  fasten  a  taint  upon  the  offspring,  and  unless  he  be  of  heroic 
mould  and  purpose,  he  too  will  follow  on  in  the  same  way,  and  add 
to  the  count  of  crime  and  wrong.  Is  not  the  life  of  the  individual 
inextricably  bound  up  with  the  life  of  the  family  ?  Does  not  the  new- 
born child  come  into  the  world  with  the  inherited  blessing  of  the 
house  bright  upon  him,  or  with  the  curse  casting  its  dark  shadow 
over  him?  This  is  the  truth  which  the  Greeks  have  embodied  in 
those  wonderful  tales  of  illustrious  but  guilty  families;  but  so 
graphically  have  they  represented  the  inherited  blessing  and  curse, 
that  it  has  impressed  itself  upon  men's  minds  to  the  exclusion  of 
the  rest  of  their  teaching.  And  even  so,  to  them  the  case  is  not 
hopeless,  for  Orestes  stays  the  curse  from  the  Atridae,  and  the 
upright  Thersander  is  proof  against  the  evil  of  the  Labdacidae. 
But  the  Greeks  also  saw  other  aspects  of  life;  and  heredity,  far 
from  being  the  central,  pivotal  theme,  made  only  one  element  in 
their  poetry.  Much  more  do  they  dwell  upon  this,  that  man  is  free ; 
but  while  he  ranges  wide  in  thought  and  fancy,  exulting  in  his 
freedom,  Zeus  and  his  laws  he  must  hold  in  reverence.  'Insolence 
is  the  very  "child"  of  impiety;  but  from  healthfulness  of  soul 
cometh  what  all  desire  and  pray  for — happiness.  '60 

In  dealing  with  the  Greeks,  we  must  remember  that  we  have  to 
do  with  a  people  of  vivid  imagination,  to  whom  the  created  world  not 
only  was  instinct  with  life  and  energy,  but  had  in  it  something  of  the 

•o  Aeschylus,  Eumenides  536-540.    Verrall  's  translation. 


L 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  151 

divine  as  well.  And  so  the  rippling,  laughing  streams  had  their 
naiads,  and  the  forest  glades  and  mountain  hollows  their  nymphs, 
while  dryads  dwelt  in  the  murmuring,  swaying  trees,  and  the  fifty 
Nereids  in  radiant  beauty  danced  amid  ocean's  dancing  waves. 
So  did  thought  and  fancy  play  over  all  nature,  weaving  and  inter- 
weaving those  many-stranded  myths  of  perennial  freshness  and 
charm.  And  not  simply  the  world  of  sensible  realities,  but  abstract 
qualities  as  well,  were  quickened  by  their  imagination;  no  longer 
cold  abstractions,  they  were  conceived  of  as  having  the  imprint  of 
the  divine  and  the  warmth  and  glow  of  life;  as,  for  example, 
Reverence  and  Compassion  (AiSws),  and  Justice  (Ai/07)  enthroned 
with  Zeus,  and  Oath  ("Ookos),  the  servant  of  Zeus  who  witnesseth 
all  things. 

f^rSo  perhaps  Molpa,  the  allotment  of  Zeus  to  mortals,  becomes  a 
'  deity ;  though  only  three  times  even  in  Homer  do  we  find  the  MoTpat 
regarded  as  persons  who  at  the  birth  of  each  man  weave  for  him  the 
lot  of  life  and  death.  "What  is  the  meaning  of  this  word  MoTpa?',  It 
comes  from  /xeCpeadai,  to  divide,  and  means  part  or  allotted  portion. 
Thus  each  god  has  his  allotted  portion  or  province — a  certain  de- 
partment of  nature  or  field  of  activity.  In  the  Iliad,  Posidon, 
referring  to  Zeus,  declares:  'We  are  three  brothers  .  .  .  and  in 
three  lots  are  all  things  divided,  and  each  took  his  appointed  domain 
[or  'privilege,'  'status']  ;  .  .  .  masterful  though  he  be,  let  him 
stay  quiet  in  his  own  third  part  [p-o(prj\.>91  'We  may  be  certain,' 
says  Farnell,  'that  they  [/*oTpa  and  rx>xrj\  did  not  arise  owing  to  the 
force  of  the  conception  of  an  over-ruling  fate,  but  more  probably  as 
unpretentious  daimones  of  birth,  who  gave  his  luck  or  his  lot  to  the 
infant.  ...  As  Democritus  well  said,  ' '  Men  have  feigned  an  image 
of  Luck,  a  mask  of  their  own  folly."  '62  So  Euripides:  'From  the 
beginning  have  the  fates  [MoTpai,  the  goddesses  who  presided  at 
my  birth]  stretched  out  for  me  a  cruel  childhood.*68  And  so  Pin- 
dar: 'Now  if  there  be  enmity  between  kin,  the  fates  [MoTpai] 
stand  aloof,  and  would  fain  hide  the  shame.  '64  According  to  Fair- 
pHbanks :  ^Moira  (often  translated  fate)  is  not  any  power  higher  than 
the  gods,  and  therefore  the  ultimate  background  of  the  universe; 
it  would  be  truer  to  call  it  the  conscience  of  the  gods/}  As  men 
ought  to  uphold  the  moral  order,  ought  not  to  act  w«p  p.6povy 

tilliad   15. 187  ff.     Compare   Bacchylides   4.20;    Sophocles,   Antigone   170, 
896;  Euripides,  Medea  860,  987,  995,  1281. 
82  Farnell,  Cults  of  the  Greek  States  5.  447. 
«s  Euripides,  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  203-207. 
«4  Pindar,  P.  4. 145-146. 


152  ABBY  LEACH 

so  the  gods  feel  under  obligation  to  uphold  the  moral  order  of  the 
universe.  .  .  .  The  existence  of  natural  law  in  the  physical  world, 
and  of  eternal  principles  in  the  moral  world,  early  made  a  deep 
impression  on  the  Greek  mind.  ...  The  precepts  in  the  Works  and 
Days  of  Hesiod,  or  in  the  poetry  of  Theognis  and  Solon,  embody 
the  thought  of  generations  on  law  and  order  in  the  physical  world 
and  in  the  moral  world.'  (Lit  is  Zeus  who  dispenses  good  and  evil 
to  men,  Zeus  to  whom  the  epic  heroes  commonly  pray.) ...  As  an 
actor  in  the  poem,  however,  Zeus  cannot  always  follow  his  personal 
desires  ;(when  Sarpedon  is  hard-pressed  by  Patroclus,  Zeus  ques- 
tions whether  to  let  his  friend  die  or  snatch  him  away  to  his  home 
in  Lycia,  till  Hera  reminds  him  that  it  is  Sarpedon 's  lot  to  die  at 
this  time.  "Neither  men  nor  gods  can  ward  it  off,  when  the  bale- 
ful lot  of  death  overtakes  a  man. "  j  Is  this  lot  or  portion  a  fate 
higher  than  Zeus  ?  or  is  it  part  of  the  ' '  ancient  decrees  of  the  gods ' ' 
which  Zeus  is  bound  to  obey?  The  question  is  never  asked  in  such 
form  by  the  poet,  who  recognizes  no  power  higher  than  that  of 
Zeus.  ...  If  Zeus  saved  Sarpedon  he  would  be  acting  virlp  fiopov, 
V^contrary  to  the  "ought"  which  he  felt  binding  on  himself.'65 

To  the  same  effect  writes  F.  M.  Cornford;  further,  as  in  the 
Ionian  philosopher,  so  in  Homer,  the  ordinance  of  fate  is  not  a 
mere  blind  and  senseless  barrier  of  impossibility;  it  is  a  moral 
decree — the  boundary  of  right  and  wrong.  We  may  even  say  that 
the  two  notions  of  Destiny  and  Right  are  hardly  distinguished.. 
This  comes  out  in  the  phrase  "beyond  what  is  ordained,"  "beyond 
fate ' '  ( virep  fxopov,  iwep  alvav ) ,  which  in  Homer  halts  between  the 
two  meanings:  "beyond  what  is  destined,  and  so  must  be,"  and 
1 '  beyond  what  is  right,  and  so  ought  to  be. ' '  Thus,  when  the  first 
sense — destiny — is  uppermost,  it  is  denied  that  God  or  man  can 
make  anything  happen  "beyond  fate."66 '(.But  elsewhere  we  find, 
on  the  contrary,  that  things  do  happen  "beyond  fate."  In  the 
Iliad61  the  Achaeans  prevail  for  a  time  in  battle  vn-kp  <u<rav.68  .  .  . 
Here,  it  is  evident,  the  moral  sense  is  uppermost.  The  offenders 
went  beyond,  not  their  fate,  but  the  bounds  of  morality.  Hence  in 
such  cases  the  balance  is  redressed  by  swiftly  following  vengeance, 
which  itself  is  "beyond  what  is  ordained"  in  the  sense  that  the 
sinners  brought  it  upon  themselves  by  their  own  wickedness,  so 

«»  Fairbanks,  A  Handbook  of  Greek  Religion,  pp.  310,  140,  141. 
86  Iliad  6.  487. 

67  Ibid.  16.  780. 

68  Odyssey  1.  34  has  'beyond  what  is  ordained.' 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  153 

that  they,  and  not  fate,  are  responsible.'69  When  Croesus  blames 
the  oracle  for  his  defeat,  Apollo  throws  the  responsibility  upon 
Croesus  because  he  took  the  interpretation  that  pleased  him,  with- 
out further  inquiry,  and  Croesus  thereupon  acknowledges  'that  the 
fault  was  his,  not  the  god's.'70  'The  casting  the  lots  of  Hector  and 
Achilles  into  the  scale,'  says  Farnell,71  'cannot  be  interpreted  as  a 
questioning  of  the  superior  will  of  fate,  for  Zeus  never  does  this 
elsewhere;  the  act  might  as  naturally  be  explained  as  a  divine 
method  of  drawing  lots,  or,  as  Welcker  prefers,  a  symbol  of  his 
long  and  dubious  reflection. n2  .  J . 

<*"*  After  a  careful  study  of  all  the  passages  in  Sophocles  bearing 
on  the  topic,  Dr.  Josef  Kohn  reaches  this  result  :|j,hat  the  Motpat 
do  have  a  personal  existence ;  that  they  are  subordinated  to  Zeus ; 
that  their  activity  is  more  or  less  completely  in  the  background, 
while  Zeus  appears  as  the  sole  ruler  of  the  world  and  guide  of  the 
fate  allotted  by  him  with  wisdom  to  each  one]!8  .  .  . 

A  question  of  this  kind,  however,  cannot  be  settled  by  citations 
and  the  statistical  method ;  it  is  determined  rather  by  the  ideals  and 
general  trend  of  life,  and  especially  by  the  delineation  of  heroes 
and  heroines  in  literature.  Take  Odysseus,  a  typical  Greek,  and 
what  do  we  find?  A  man  resourceful,  ready  to  meet  emergencies, 
quick-witted,  daring — an  excellent  hero  for  a  tale  in  which  we  have 
a  curious  interplay  between  divine  agencies  and  human  strength 
and  prowess.  Of  himself,  Odysseus  gets  the  better  of  the  Cyclops 
when  his  venturesomeness  has  nearly  cost  him  his  life ;  nor  is  there 
anything  cleverer  in  the  whole  story  than  his  cunning  escape.  In 
his  meeting  with  Circe,  however,  he  is  fortified  against  her  magic 
arts  by  the  antidote  that  he  has  received  from  Hermes ;  but,  on  the 
other  hand,  he  has  strength  in  himself  alone  to  hold  out  against 
Calypso  of  the  radiant  hair,  his  deep  longing  for  his  native  land 
and  those  he  has  left  behind  giving  way  not  even  to  the  lure  of 
becoming  an  immortal.  And  while  his  companions  are  fine  exam- 
ples of  those  who  in  spite  of  ample  warning  perish  through  their 
own  folly,  it  is  his  own  heart,  and  not  the  gods,  that  the  hero  chides, 
when  he  is  trying  to  regain  his  own,  upon  his  return  to  his  native 
land.74    As  Odysseus  is  portrayed,  with  a  keen  love  of  knowledge, 

«»  Cornford,  From  Religion  to  Philosophy,  pp.  13,  14. 
to  Herodotus  1.91. 

'i  Farnell,  Cults  of  the  Greek  States  1.  79. 

[T2  For  reasons  of  space,  a  small  portion  of  the  article  by  Miss  Leach  is  here 
omitted. — Editor.] 

78  Kohn,  Zeus  und  sein  Verhdltnis  zu  den  Moirai  nach  Sophokles. 
i*  Odyssey  20. 18. 


154  ABBY  LEACH 

energetic,  hopeful;  sometimes  cast  down  and  in  fear,  but  soon 
gathering  together  his  forces  for  new  endeavor;  alert,  active,  with 
mind  quick  to  conceive,  and  with  courage  to  execute ;  what  has  he 
in  common  with  the  stolid  fatalist  who  grimly  says:  'If  it  must 
come,  it  must,  and  there  is  nothing  I  can  do  to  change  it'? 

Not  man's  impotence,  but  man's  power,  not  his  limitations,  but 
his  achievements,  are  the  favorite  theme  of  the  Greeks — as  in  the 
chorus  of  the  Antigone:  'Many  wonders  there  are,  but  nothing  is 
more  wonderful  than  man.'75  'He  hath  resource  for  all;  without 
resource  he  meets  nothing  that  must  come.'76  The  danger  is  that 
he  will  be  led  astray  by  his  very  strength  and  power.  'Seek  not 
to  become  Zeus,'  says  Pindar;  'mortal  things  befit  mortals.'77  This 
is  the  keynote  of  Greek  teaching.  No  dark,  sinister  fate  hovers  over 
them,  chilling  enterprise  and  benumbing  their  hearts.  The  gods 
are  not  inflexible  in  purpose  or  inexorable.  In  the  Iliad  Glaucus 
prays  Apollo  to  heal  him  of  his  wound  in  order  that  he  may  rescue 
the  body  of  Sarpedon,  and  Apollo  grants  him  his  wish.78  Accord- 
ing to  Euripides,  there  is  a  saying  that  'Gifts  persuade  even  the 
gods.'79 

The  Greeks  were  wonderful  interpreters  of  life.  Clear-eyed,  they 
looked  out  upon  the  world,  and  they  knew  how  to  record  what  they 
saw  so  that  it  lives  again  for  those  who  read.  And  what  did  they 
see  ?  The  same  that  any  one  sees  who  goes  through  life  and  reflects 
upon  it — that,  calculate  as  we  will,  forecast  events  as  we  will,  how- 
ever fortunate  and  successful  we  may  be,  yet  outside  and  beyond 
the  reach  of  any  effort  of  ours,  there  is  an  incalculable  element  with 
which  we  have  to  reckon.  Before  it  we  stand  powerless;  the  un- 
foreseen intervenes,  our  purposes  are  frustrated,  our  endeavors 
baffled,  our  success  changed  to  failure,  our  prosperity  to  ruin. 

We  say:  'Mysterious  are  the  workings  of  Providence.'  'We 
know  not  what  a  day  will  bring  forth. '  '  God's  ways  are  inscrutable 
and  past  finding  out.'  'Verily  thou  art  a  God  that  hidest  thy- 
self.'— All  of  which  means  that  there  is  some  mysterious  power 
working  its  will  in  the  world,  in  unaccountable  ways,  and  with 
tragic  consequences  at  times. 

'Count  no  man  happy  till  his  death,'  said  the  wise  Solon;  and 

75  Sophocles,  Antigone  332. 

19  Ibid.  360. 

"  Pindar,  I.  5.14;  I.  5.16. 

78  Iliad  16.  523  ff. 

79  Euripides,  Medea  964. 


FREE  WILL  IN  GREEK  LITERATURE  155 

the  Greeks  repeat  the  sentiment  again  and  again  in  their  literature. 
So,  for  example,  Simonides: 

Mortal  man  that  thou  art,  never  say  what  will  be  on  the  morrow ; 
Nor  yet,  when  thou  beholdest  one  prospering,  shalt  thou  say  how 

long  time  he  will  continue; 
For  swift  comes  the  change, 
Yea,  swifter  than  in  the  life  of  the  long-winged  fly.80 

What  do  the  Greeks  say?  They  say:  Man  is  a  free  agent,  but 
with  an  ancestral  heritage  for  blessing  or  bane.  Man  is  a  free 
agent,  but  subject  to  fareeghg  figpnflt  poptrol.  Man  is  a _free  agent, 
butrxhe  area  of  his  powers  Tshedged  about  with  impassable  limits. 
Man  is  a  free  agent,  but  he  is  mortal.  Do  we  not  say  the  same? 
Who  has  ever  been  able  to  set  the  bounds  and  to  mark  out  where 
free  agency  ends  and  divine  intervention  begins?  But  this  does 
not  prevent  us  any  more  than  the  Greeks  from  trying  to  carve  out 
our  fortunes,  or  from  believing  that,  measurably  at  least,  we  are 
masters  of  our  fate. 

Wherein  lay  the  greatness  of  the  Greeks?  Was  it  not  in  that 
creative  genius,  essentially  free  and  untrammeled,  which  they  pos- 
sessed to  such  a  high  degree,  and  which  found  expression  in  their 
matchless  literature  and  art?  Was  it  not  in  the  free  play  of 
thought  and  fancy,  that  delighted  to  range  at  will?  Freedom  of 
thought,  freedom  of  action,  love  of  the  beautiful,  joy  in  living, 
incessant  activity,  eager  emulation  in  pursuit  of  honor  and  glory, 
fertility  of  resource,  and  confidence  in  their  own  resolute  daring — 
all  these  are  incontestably  theirs;  and  all  these  are  diametrically 
opposed  to  any  fatalistic  doctrine,  to  anything  bordering  on  patient 
and  unquestioning  submission  to  the  fixed  and  unalterable  decrees 
of  fate.  The  Greeks  merely  did  not  deceive  themselves.  '  In  a  little 
moment, '  says  Pindar,  '  groweth  up  the  delight  of  men ;  yea,  and  in 
like  sort  falleth  it  to  the  ground,  when  a  doom  adverse  hath  shaken 
it.  Things  of  a  day — what  are  we,  and  what  not  ?  Man  is  a  dream 
of  shadows. '  But  then  comes  the  other  note :  '  Nevertheless,  when 
a  glory  from  God  hath  shined  on  them,  a  clear  light  abideth  upon 
men,  and  serene  life.  '81 

80  Simonides  32  [46]. 

si  Pindar,  P.  8.  92-97.    Myers'  translation. 


XI 

OEDIPUS  REX:  A  TYPICAL  GREEK  TRAGEDY  1 

By  Marjorie  L.  Barstow 

In  an  ideal  tragedy,  says  Aristotle,  'even  without  seeing  the 
things  take  place,  he  who  simply  hears  the  account  of  them  shall 
be  filled  with  horror  and  pity  at  the  incidents ' ;  and  he  adds :  '  So 
it  is  with  the  Oedipus.'  But  the  modern  reader,  coming  to  the 
ancient  classical  drama  not  wholly  for  the  purpose  of  enjoyment, 
will  not  always  respond  to  the  story  with  intense  and  purifying 
sympathy.  He  is  preoccupied  with  what  he  has  heard  concerning 
the  'fatalism'  of  the  Greek  drama;  he  is  repelled  by  what  seems  to 
be  a  cruel  injustice  in  the  downfall  of  Oedipus;  and,  finding  no 
solution  for  these  intellectual  difficulties,  he  loses  half  the  pleasure 
which  the  Oedipus  Rex  was  intended  to  produce.  Perhaps  we  trou- 
ble ourselves  too  much  concerning  Greek  notions  of  fate  in  human 
life.  We  are  inclined  to  regard  them  with  a  lively  antiquarian 
interest,  as  if  they  were  something  remote  and  peculiar ;  yet  in  real- 
ity the  essential  difference  between  these  conceptions  and  the  more 
familiar  ideas  of  a  later  time  is  so  slight  that  it  need  hardly  concern 
a  naive  and  sympathetic  reader.  If  we  substitute  'heredity'  for 
'fate,'  and  'environment'  for  the  series  of  external  accidents  which 
result  in  the  downfall  of  Oedipus,  we  begin  to  perceive  that  the  hero 
of  the  old  Greek  story  was,  as  Aristotle  says,  '  a  man  like  ourselves, ' 
living  and  suffering  under  the  same  laws.  But,  after  all,  the  funda- 
mental aim  of  the  poet  is  not  to  teach  us  specific  laws,  but  to  con- 
struct a  tragedy  which  shall  completely  fulfil  its  artistic  function. 
In  this  function  there  is  a  regenerative  power  infinitely  more  vital 
than  any  specific  teaching. 

But  the  student  of  literature  cannot  stop  with  naive  and  sym- 
pathetic reading.  It  is  his  business,  not  only  to  feel,  but  to  think. 
And  whether  he  thinks  of  the  Oedipus  Rex  as  representing  what 
the  Greeks  observed  and  thought  concerning  human  life,  or  whether 

[i  This  paper  was  prepared  by  Miss  Barstow  when  she  was  a  Sophomore  in 
Cornell  University.  It  was  first  printed  in  the  Classical  Weekly  for  October  5, 
1912,  and  is  reprinted  with  slight  alterations. — Editor.] 


OEDIPUS  REX:  A  TYPICAL  GREEK  TRAGEDY     157 

he  is  interested  in  the  artistic  structure  of  the  tragedy,  he  encoun- 
ters the  same  problem — the  real  relation  of  the  character  of  the  hero 
to  the  external  accidents  which  seem  to  determine  his  fate.  Al- 
though Aristotle  seems  to  regard  the  Oedipus  as  well-nigh  a  perfect 
tragedy,  he  also  says  that  a  tragic  hero  should  be  a  man  not  'pre- 
eminently virtuous  and  just, '  who  meets  disaster  through  some  flaw 
in  his  own  nature.  But  to  the  sympathetic  reader  Oedipus  seems 
almost  as  virtuous  and  just  as  a  man  may  reasonably  be  expected 
to  be.  He  does  what  is  moral  and  expedient  according  to  his  lights ; 
and  his  ruin  appears,  at  first,  to  result  from  a  flaw  in  the  universe, 
an  irrationally  malignant  fate,  rather  than  from  any  flaw  in  his 
own  generous  personality.  But  if  we  consider  what  'pre-eminently 
virtuous  and  just'  meant  to  a  Greek,  the  difficulties  vanish.  In 
other  words,  when  we  seek  the  standard  of  a  perfect  tragedy  in 
Aristotle's  Poetics,  let  us  seek  the  standard  of  a  perfect  life  in  his 
Ethics. 

In  the  Nichomachean  Ethics,  Aristotle  defines  the  end  of  human 
endeavor  as  'happiness.'  By  this  he  means,  not  pleasure — for 
pleasure  is  only  a  part  of  happiness, — but  a  harmonious  and  un- 
hampered activity  of  the  whole  human  personality  throughout  a 
complete  lifetime.  This  happiness  does  not  spring  primarily  from 
the  gifts  of  fortune — wealth,  social  position,  personal  beauty,  and 
the  like.  A  man  may  have  all  these  and  yet  be  wretched.  It  results 
from  a  steady  and  comprehensive  vision  by  which  he  perceives  the 
relation  of  various  experiences  and  choices  of  life  to  one  another  and 
to  the  supreme  goal.  By  the  light  of  this  vision  the  wise  man  pre- 
serves a  just  balance  among  his  own  natural  impulses,  and  firmly 
and  consistently  directs  his  will  and  emotions  in  accordance  with 
'true  reason.'  He  will  not  sacrifice  the  health  of  a  lifetime  to  the 
satisfaction  of  a  particular  appetite,  for  instance,  nor  in  a  moment 
of  wild  anger  blind  himself  to  all  considerations  of  wisdom  and 
humanity.  Being  at  peace  with  himself,  he  has  an  inward  happi- 
ness which  cannot  be  shaken  save  by  great  and  numerous  outward 
misfortunes;  and,  moreover,  he  attains  to  an  adequate  external 
prosperity,  since,  other  things  being  equal,  the  most  sensible  people 
are  the  most  successful,  and  misfortune  is  in  large  measure  due  to 
lack  of  knowledge  or  of  prudence.  Even  if  he  is  overwhelmed  by 
some  great  external  disaster,  the  ideal  character  of  the  Ethics  is  not 
an  object  of  fear  and  pity;  for  the  'truly  good  and  sensible  man 
bears  all  the  chances  of  life  with  decorum,  and  always  does  what  is 
noblest  in  the  circumstances,  as  a  good  general  uses  the  forces  at  his 
command  to  the  best  advantage  in  war.'     The  spectacular  self- 


158  MARJORIE  L.  BARSTOW 

destruction  with  which  a  tragedy  often  ends  would  be  impossible 
for  a  hero  who  '  bears  all  the  chances  of  life  with  decorum. ' 

Such  is  the  ideal  character  who  is  best  fitted  to  achieve  happiness 
in  the  world  of  men.  On  the  other  hand,  the  tragic  hero  is  a  man 
who  fails  to  attain  happiness,  but  fails  in  such  a  manner  that  his 
fall  excites,  not  blame,  but  pity  and  fear  in  the  highest  degree.  To 
arouse  our  pity,  his  misfortunes  must  seem,  in  a  measure,  unde- 
served ;  he  must  be  a  man  whom  we  wish  well,  a  lovable  or  admirable 
man.  To  arouse  our  fear,  his  case  must  seem  typical.  "We  must 
feel  that  he  is  a  man  like  ourselves;  that  what  he  does  we,  under 
like  circumstances,  might  also  do.  Yet,  as  Aristotle  notices,  the  fall 
of  a  perfectly  good  man  through  no  fault  of  his  own  is  so  shocking 
to  our  sense  of  justice  that  we  are  repelled  by  it  rather  than  touched 
to  pity.  Therefore  the  tragic  hero  must  be,  not  pre-eminently 
good — not  wholly  under  the  guidance  of  true  reason ;  and  he  him- 
self must  be  directly,  though  not  always  wittingly,  responsible  for 
what  happens  to  him.  Moreover,  in  order  that  his  downfall  may  be 
as  striking  as  possible,  he  must  be  'of  the  number  of  those  in  the 
enjoyment  of  great  reputation  and  prosperity.' 

How  does  all  this  apply  to  Oedipus?  According  to  our  usual 
standards,  Oedipus  is  a  good  man ;  there  is  even  a  certain  vehemence 
in  his  wish  to  do  right.  In  most  of  the  crises  in  which  he  makes 
a  choice  that  eventually  brings  misfortune,  he  is  either  impetuously 
trying  to  avoid  what  is  wrong,  or  ardently  striving  to  do  what  is 
right.  He  has  the  best  intentions  in  the  world.  Moreover,  he  is  not 
a  fool.  He  has  the  quick  wit  and  brilliance  that  all  men  especially 
admire  and  envy.  The  moment  a  problem  is  presented  to  his  mind, 
he  has  a  solution — a  solution  which  his  courage  and  enterprise  lead 
him  to  test  by  immediate  action.  Clever,  bold,  and  generous,  he 
seems  born  to  be  a  leader  and  a  hero.  Most  popular  heroes  in 
literature  and  life  are  men  like  Oedipus.  Yet  his  noble  purposes 
end  in  the  crimes  whose  very  names  filled  him  with  horror ;  and  his 
brilliant  inspirations  only  blind  him  to  the  truth  that  a  duller  man 
might  see.  But  this  spectacular  and  ironical  failure  furnishes  no 
greater  contrast  to  the  dignified  harmony  of  the  ideal  life  suggested 
in  the  Aristotelian  Ethics  than  does  the  character  of  Oedipus  to 
that  of  the  perfect  man  whose  wisdom  bears  fruit  in  happiness ;  for 
Oedipus  lacks  the  one  vital  and  essential  element  in  this  happi- 
ness^— the  power  to  see  the  relation  of  one  thing  to  another  and  to 
maintain  a  due  proportion  in  the  expenditure  of  energy.  Oedipus 
can  see  only  one  thing  at  a  time,  and  it  is  his  habit  to  act  imme- 
diately on  half -knowledge  with  the  utmost  intensity  and  abandon. 


OEDIPUS  BEX:  A  TYPICAL  GREEK  TRAGEDY     159 

His  lack  of  the  'intellectual  virtues'  of  Aristotle  is  paralleled  only 
by  his  inability  to  keep  the  mean  in  the  '  moral  virtues. '  And  so  his 
fits  and  starts  of  noble  action,  being  without  purpose  or  design, 
nullify  and  contradict  each  other,  and  end  in  hopeless  confusion 
and  ruin.  This  is  the  flaw  in  the  character  of  Oedipus — a  weakness 
at  the  very  centre  of  his  being,  from  which  all  other  weaknesses, 
such  as  his  fatal  tendency  to  anger,  naturally  arise.  Perhaps  this 
will  be  clearer  if  we  consider  how  Oedipus  acts  in  each  crisis  of 
his  life. 

When  the  drama  opens,  his  thoughtless  energy  has  already  led 
him  into  the  very  crimes  which  he  has  striven  to  avoid.  Once,  at  a 
feast  in  Corinth,  a  man  had  tauntingly  said  that  Oedipus  was  not 
the  true  son  of  Polybus.  These  idle  words  of  a  man  in  his  cups  so 
affected  the  excitable  nature  of  the  hero  that  he  shortly  went  to 
Delphi  to  learn  the  truth — to  consult  the  most  holy  shrine  in  Greece, 
the  sacred  tribunal  to  which  great  national  questions  were  sub- 
mitted. The  sole  response  of  the  oracle  was  the  prophecy  that 
Oedipus  would  kill  his  father  and  marry  his  mother.  This,  of 
course,  should  have  given  a  real  importance  to  what  was  origi- 
nally only  an  idle  suspicion;  it  was  now  necessary  to  know  the 
truth.  So,  at  least,  a  wise  man  who  does  what  is  best  in  the  cir- 
cumstances, 'as  a  good  general  uses  the  forces  at  his  command  to 
the  best  advantage  in  war,'  would  have  thought.  But  Oedipus, 
wholly  absorbed  in  another  fear,  completely  forgot  his  former 
doubt.  Supposing  the  prophecy  to  refer  to  Polybus,  he  determined 
never  to  return  to  Corinth,  and  hastened  away  in  the  direction  of 
Thebes.  Thus  his  disposition  to  act  without  thinking  started  him 
headlong  on  the  road  to  destruction.  At  a  place  where  three  ways 
met,  all  unawares,  he  encountered  his  real  father,  King  Laius  of 
Thebes.  When  the  old  man  insolently  accosted  him,  Oedipus,  with 
his  usual  misguided  promptness,  struck  him  from  the  chariot,  and 
slew  him  and  all  but  one  of  his  attendants.  Thus,  by  an  unreason- 
able act  of  passion,  Oedipus  fulfilled  the  first  part  of  his  prophetic 
destiny.  Yet,  in  these  cases,  as  in  most  of  the  crimes  of  his  life, 
either  one  of  the  two  fundamental  Greek  virtues — either  temperance 
or  prudence — would  have  saved  him.  A  temperate  man,  with  the 
Greek  sense  of  fitness  and  decorum,  would  never  have  permitted 
the  chance  words  of  a  man  in  his  cups  to  send  him  to  Delphi,  in 
the  first  place;  and  so  he  might  have  remained  safe  in  his  igno- 
rance. A  prudent  man,  having  attached  so  much  importance  to 
the  suspicion,  would  not  have  forgotten  it  so  soon.  Again,  a  tem- 
perate man  would  not  be  so  ready  to  kill  an  old  man  who  angered 


160  MAEJORIE  L.  BARSTOW 

him;  a  prudent  man,  even  one  of  violent  emotions,  after  hearing 
the  oracle,  might  have  deemed  it  best  to  put  some  restraint  upon 
himself  in  the  future.  But  Oedipus  possessed  neither  tne  unselfish 
wisdom  of  a  good  man,  nor  the  selfish  prudence  of  many  a  bad 
one. 

Yet  in  the  crisis  in  which  Oedipus  found  the  city  of  Thebes,  his 
energy  and  directness  served  him  well.  By  the  flashing  quickness 
of  thought  and  imagination  which,  when  blinded  by  egoistic  pas- 
sion, so  often  hurried  him  to  wrong  conclusions,  he  guessed  the 
riddle  of  the  Sphinx.  Then  he  married  the  widowed  queen,  seized 
the  reins  of  government,  and  generously  did  his  best  to  bring  peace 
and  prosperity  back  to  the  troubled  land.  In  this  way,  by  the  very 
qualities  that  ultimately  wrought  his  ruin,  he  was  raised  to  the 
height  from  which  he  fell.  But  here  again  he  displayed  the  thought- 
lessness that  was  his  destruction;  for  he  neglected  to  make  the 
natural  inquiries  concerning  the  murder  of  Laius,  and  took  as 
little  care  to  avoid  a  rash  marriage  as  he  had  taken  to  avoid  kill- 
ing a  stranger.  His  failure  to  investigate  the  death  of  his  prede- 
cessor is  explicable  only  in  the  light  of  his  natural  violence  and 
intensity  of  action.  He  was  always  completely  absorbed  in  the 
one  matter  that  happened  to  engage  his  attention.  He  could  not 
be  interested  in  an  accident  in  the  past  when  there  was  work  to  be 
done  in  the  present.  In  this  case  also  his  mistake  was  due  to  a  lack 
of  both  wisdom  and  temperance. 

Between  his  accession  to  the  throne  of  Thebes  and  the  opening 
of  the  drama,  there  intervened  a  long  period  of  time  in  which  Oedi- 
pus had  prospered,  and,  as  it  seemed  to  the  Chorus,  had  been  quite 
happy.  The  play  of  Sophocles  is  concerned  with  the  last  stage  in 
his  tragic  career — the  complication  of  mistakes  which  is  suddenly 
untangled  by  the  words  of  the  old  Herdsman.  At  the  beginning  the 
land  is  blasted  by  a  great  dearth.  Old  men,  young  men,  and  chil- 
dren have  come  as  suppliants  to  the  king,  seeking  deliverance  from 
this  great  evil.  Oedipus  appears,  generous,  high-minded,  and 
prompt  to  act,  as  ever.  When  Creon  brings  the  message  that  the 
slayer  of  Laius  must  be  cast  out  of  the  land,  Oedipus  immediately 
invokes  a  mighty  curse  upon  the  murderer,  and  we  thrill  with  pity 
and  fear  as  we  hear  the  noble  king  calling  down  upon  his  own  head 
a  doom  so  terrible.  His  unthinking  haste  furnishes  the  first  thread 
in  the  complication  of  misunderstanding  which  the  dramatist  has 
so  closely  woven.  Tiresias  enters.  When  Oedipus,  with  angry 
insistence,  has  forced  from  his  unwilling  lips  the  dreadful  words, 
'Thou  art  the  accursed  defiler  of  this  land,'  he  forgets  everything 


OEDIPUS  REX:  A  TYPICAL  GREEK  TRAGEDY     161 

else  in  his  wrath  at  what  he  deems  a  taunt  of  the  old  prophet,  and 
entangles  a  second  thread  of  misunderstanding  with  the  first.  Still 
a  third  is  added  a  moment  later,  when  he  indignantly  accuses  Creon 
of  bribing  Tiresias  to  speak  these  words.  In  his  conversation  with 
Jocasta  the  tendency  of  Oedipus  to  jump  at  conclusions  does  for 
one  moment  show  him  half  the  truth.  He  is  possessed  with  a  fear 
that  it  was  he  who  killed  Laius,  but  here  again  he  can  think  of  but 
one  thing  at  a  time;  and,  again  absorbed  in  a  new  thought,  he 
forgets  his  wife 's  mention  of  a  child  of  Laius,  forgets  the  old  ques- 
tion concerning  his  birth,  and  accordingly  misses  the  truth. 

Then  comes  the  message  from  Corinth.  After  his  first  joy  in 
learning  that  his  supposed  father  did  not  die  as  the  oracle  had 
foretold,  Oedipus  loses  all  remembrance  of  the  oracle,  and  all  fear 
concerning  the  death  of  Laius,  in  a  new  interest  and  a  new  fear — 
the  fear  that  he  may  be  base-born.  Eagerly  following  up  this 
latest  train  of  thought,  he  at  last  comes  upon  the  truth  in  a  form 
which  even  he  can  grasp  at  once.  In  his  agony  at  the  vision  to 
which  for  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  has  now  attained,  he  cries  out : 
'  Oh !  Oh !  All  brought  to  pass — all  true !  Thou  light,  may  I  now 
look  my  last  on  thee — I  who  have  been  found  accursed  in  birth, 
accursed  in  wedlock,  accursed  in  the  shedding  of  blood. '  In  a  final 
act  of  mad  energy,  he  puts  out  the  eyes  which  could  not  see,  and 
demands  the  execution  upon  himself  of  the  doom  which  he  alone 
had  decreed.  This  is  the  end  of  the  great-souled  man,  endowed 
with  all  the  gifts  of  nature,  but  heedless  alike  of  the  wisdom  and 
temperance  by  which  the  magnanimous  man  of  the  Ethics  finds  his 
way  to  perfect  virtue  and  happiness. 

Perhaps  we  are  not  entirely  reconciled  to  the  fate  of  Oedipus. 
Perhaps  the  downfall  of  a  tragic  hero  can  never  satisfy  the  indi- 
vidual reader's  sense  of  justice.  If  the  doom  is  wholly  just,  why 
should  we  pity  the  sufferer?  The  poet,  by  the  necessity  of  his  art, 
is  bound  to  make  the  particular  representation  of  a  universal  truth 
as  terrible  and  as  pitiful  as  he  can.  Surely  this  result  is  accom- 
plished in  the  Oedipus  Rex.  And  in  the  production  of  this  tragic 
effect,  the  apparent  'fatalism' — in  the  oracles,  for  instance,  and  in 
the  performance  of  the  prophesied  crimes  by  Oedipus,  in  ignorance 
of  the  circumstances — is  a  powerful  agent.  Aristotle  himself  men- 
tions crimes  committed  in  ignorance  of  the  particulars  as  deeds 
which  especially  arouse  pity.  The  oracles  have  a  threefold  artistic 
function.  They  produce  that  sense  of  impending  doom,  that  fear- 
ful consciousness  of  the  ironical  contrast  between  the  actual  facts 
and  the  opinions  of  the  hero,  which  raises  pity  into  awe.     They 


162  MARJORIE  L.  BARSTOW 

serve  as  a  stimulus  to  the  hero's  own  nature,  without  determining 
the  result  of  the  stimulus — though  it  is  noteworthy  that  the  initial 
impulse  is  not  derived  from  them.  And  lastly,  they  point  out  in 
clear  and  impressive  language  the  course  of  the  story.  Shake- 
speare, in  Macbeth  and  Hamlet,  introduces  less  noble  and  less  prob- 
able forms  of  the  supernatural  for  the  same  purpose.  The  oracles 
of  Sophocles,  like  the  ghosts  and  witches  of  Shakespeare,  are  but 
means  to  an  artistic  end.  The  representation  of  their  effect  upon 
the  characters  is  not  the  end  of  the  drama,  and  must  not  be  so 
regarded.  They  embody  the  final  teaching  of  the  poet  as  little  as 
the  words  of  particular  dramatic  characters,  in  particular  circum- 
stances, express  the  poet's  own  unbiased  thought  and  feeling. 

The  central  conception  of  the  Oedipus  Rex  is  plainly  not  more 
fatalistic  than  the  philosophy  of  Aristotle.  Oedipus  is  the  architect 
of  his  own  fortune  as  truly  as  the  magnanimous  man  of  the  Ethics 
is  the  architect  of  his.  If  any  reader  finds  the  doctrine  hard,  he 
may  remember  that  Sophocles  himself  completed  it,  somewhat  as 
the  Christian  Church  completed  Aristotle,  and  in  the  death  of 
Oedipus  at  Colonus  crowned  the  law  with  grace.  Nevertheless,  for 
the  understanding  alike  of  Greek  philosophy  and  Greek  art,  it  seems 
necessary  to  recognize  the  relation  between  these  two  ideal  concep- 
tions— the  magnanimous  man  of  the  Nichomachean  Ethics,  ideal  for 
life  and  happiness,  the  tragic  hero  of  the  Poetics,  ideal  for  misery 
and  death.  According  to  Aristotle,  the  man  who  is  truly  happy  in 
this  world  is  the  wise  man  who  sees  in  all  their  aspects  the  facts  or 
the  forces  with  which  he  is  dealing,  and  can  balance  and  direct  his 
own  impulses  in  accordance  with  that  vision.  He  is  a  general, 
victorious,  not  only  because  he  is  courageous,  but  because  he  has 
planned  wisely;  an  artist  who  makes  of  his  life  something  as  per- 
fect as  a  Greek  temple  or  a  Greek  play.  In  the  Oedipus  Rex,  Sopho- 
cles had  already  shown  the  reverse.  The  man  who  sees  but  one 
side  of  a  matter,  and  straightway,  driven  on  by  his  uncontrolled 
emotions,  acts  in  accordance  with  that  imperfect  vision,  meets  a 
fate  most  terrible  and  pitiful,  in  accordance  with  the  great  laws 
established  by  the  gods. 

This  philosophy  of  Aristotle  and  Sophocles  is  clearly  suggested 
in  the  drama  itself.  'May  destiny  still  find  me,'  sings  the  Chorus, 
'winning  the  praise  of  reverent  purity  in  all  words  and  deeds 
sanctioned  by  those  laws  of  range  sublime,  called  into  life  through- 
out the  high,  clear  heaven,  whose  father  is  Olympus  alone;  their 
parent  was  no  race  of  mortal  men,  no,  nor  shall  oblivion  ever  lay 
them  to  sleep ;  the  god  is  mighty  in  them,  and  he  grows  not  old. ' 


XII 

THE  CHAEACTER  AND  EXTENT  OF  GREEK 
LITERATURE  * 

By  Ulrich  von  Welamowitz-Moellendorff 

The  literature  of  Greece  is  the  only  one  in  the  civilized  world 
that  developed  wholly  out  of  itself.  It  brought  forth  in  profusion 
not  only  perfect  works  of  art  but  rigorously  exclusive  artistic  types 
and  styles,  through  which  it  became  the  basis  and  model  of  the 
European  and  of  various  extra-European  literatures.  Greek  litera- 
ture is  the  vessel  that  contains,  or  has  contained,  the  fundamental 
works  of  all  science;  for  it  was  the  Greeks,  and  no  others,  that 
brought  science  as  such  into  the  world.  These  incomparable  advan- 
tages— which  nevertheless  in  the  final  analysis  are  relative — inter- 
fere with  an  absolute  appraisal  of  Greek  works  and  their  authors; 
for  when  a  work  has  served  as  a  pattern  during  two  thousand  years, 
to  see  it  as  it  appeared  to  the  man  who  once  created  it  is  no  easy 
matter;  and  to  see  in  him  an  agonizing,  striving,  erring  human 
being  is  even  harder.  Nothing  more  effectually  obscures  a  human 
figure  than  to  deify  it,  and  nothing  seems  so  far  removed  from  the 
accidents  of  genesis  as  a  classic  work  of  art — in  both  cases  exaltation 
occurs  at  the  expense  of  life.  But,  in  point  of  fact,  Homer  is  classic 
at  the  date  when  he  is  first  known  to  us ;  and  at  the  birth  of  Christ 
Greek  literature  is  already  classic  to  the  same  extent  and  in  the 
same  sense  as  a  hundred  years  ago  when  the  historical  study  of  it 
began ;  this  last  is  not  older.  The  relation  of  Goethe  to  the  Greeks 
is  not  essentially  different  from  that  of  Virgil  and  Horace,  who, 
together  with  Cicero,  produced  the  first  classical  literature  in 
another  tongue  upon  the  Greek  foundation.  Through  the  media- 
tion of  this  daughter,  Greek  literature  dominated  the  Occident  even 

[i  This  extract,  by  the  leading  classical  scholar  of  to-day  in  Germany,  and 
probably  in  the  world,  is  translated  from  Die  Griechische  und  Lateinische 
Literatur  und  Sprache  (pp.  1-4).  B.  G.  Teubner,  Berlin  and  Leipzig,  1905. 
(Die  Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  ihre  Entwickelung  und  ihre  Ziele,  herausgegeben 
von  Paul  Hinneberg,  Teil  I,  Abteilung  VIII.) — Editor.] 


164      ULRICH  VON  WILAMOWITZ-MOELLENDORFF 

in  the  long  interval  when  Western  Europe  was  without  knowledge 
of  the  original  works ;  and  when  the  original  works  became  known 
after  the  fifteenth  century,  they  were  still  primarily  viewed  with  the 
eyes  of  the  Romans,  or  of  Greeks  of  the  Roman  era,  who  stand  under 
the  same  spell  of  classicism.  But  when  Winckelmann,  with  an 
energy  conscious  of  its  aim,  made  bold  to  return  to  the  genuine 
Greeks,  and  undertook  to  draw  for  sculpture  the  line  of  its  historical 
development,  and  when  the  next  generation  in  turn  carried  this 
movement  over  to  literature,  it  was  only  the  absolute  estimation  of 
the  classic  originals  that  rose ;  for  in  regard  to  historical  knowledge, 
no  one  as  yet  was  expected  to  trace  the  process  by  which  the  Greek 
people  came  into  being — the  history  and  results  of  this  process. 
And  so  the  origin  of  Greek  literature  and  its  types  was  identified 
with  the  absolutely  normal  and  natural,  the  gaps  in  historical  knowl- 
edge were  bridged  with  philosophical  abstractions,  and  what  had 
been  effected  by  definite,  concrete  conditions,  and  by  the  individual 
power  and  will  of  important  men,  became  the  product  of  immanent 
natural  laws.  The  types  of  Greek  poetry  and  artistic  prose — epic, 
elegy,  ode,  tragedy,  comedy,  epigram,  history,  dialogue,  oration, 
epistle — appeared  as  natural  forms  in  the  arts  of  discourse.  In  all 
this  the  interpreters  still  stood  under  the  spell  of  the  ancient  theory. 
An  actual  science  of  history  the  Greeks  did  not  produce;  their 
thought  was  bent  upon  abstracting  rules  from  observation,  and  then 
working  with  these  abstractions ;  and  so  they  actually  regarded  those 
types,  which  had  grown  up  among  them  historically,  as  conceptually 
pre-existent.  The  first  man  to  compose  a  tragedy  was  not  the 
inventor — he  was  'the  first  one  to  find  it,'  as  they  said.  Prelimi- 
nary stages,  of  course,  were  recognized,  but  then  they  represented 
imperfect  forms  which  had  best  be  forgotten.  The  decisive  moment 
is  that  in  which  the  type  '  attains  to  its  own  true  nature. '  From  the 
moment  when  tragedy  has  reached  this  point — from  that  moment 
on  for  ever  one  can  compose  tragedies  only  after  this  pattern ;  and 
their  success  or  failure  is  measured  as  they  give  better  or  worse 
expression  to  the  idea  of  tragedy.  Starting  with  this  view,  the 
moderns  came  to  an  extravagant  overestimation  of  the  finders  or 
inventors — or  better,  of  the  classic  works, — and  to  a  depreciation 
of  everything  subsequent;  precisely  as  scholars,  following  the 
ancient  purists,  regarded  the  entire  evolution  of  the  language  after 
Demosthenes  as  decadent.  In  truth  it  often  looked  as  though  Greek 
literature  had  ended  with  Alexander.  And  yet  more  unjust  was 
it  when,  from  among  the  works  of  a  later  age,  that  was  preferred 
which  seemed  to  come  nearest  to  the  classic,  that  is,  nothing  more 


EXTENT  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  165 

or  less  than  pure  imitation.  Moreover,  there  was  still  another  great 
want;  for  the  philologists  had  recognized  only  in  principle  that 
historical  understanding  and  historical  evaluation  must  grasp  each 
work  and  each  author  first  of  all  in  terms  of  his  own  age  and  his 
own  intention,  and  hence  independently  of  later  estimates  quite  as 
much  as  of  distorted  historical  tradition  or  secondary  reconstruc- 
tions of  texts.  As  for  schoolmasters  who  identify  the  literature 
with  the  authors  employed  in  the  service  of  education — where  the 
standard  is  a  fixed  rule,  preferably  of  the  narrowest  description — 
we  need  not  consider  them.  It  is  naive  presumption  when  these 
ignoramuses  put  on  the  air  of  philologists. 

But  in  reality  the  history  of  Greek  literature  is  still  in  its  begin- 
nings, and  indeed,  considering  its  youth,  this  could  not  be  otherwise. 
An  account  that  should  turn  away  from  classicism  simply  on  prin- 
ciple has  in  fact  never  been  attempted.  And  indeed,  such  an 
account  could  not  as  yet  by  any  possibility  be  written.  First  of 
all,  the  extant  works  must  be  understood;  and  therewith  the  artis- 
tic forms,  and  the  principles  in  accordance  with  which  they  were 
composed,  must  be  grasped,  before  they  can  be  genetically  explained 
and  their  history  written.  And  the  individual  personalities  of  the 
authors  must  be  seized  before  they  can  be  arranged  in  historical 
connection,  and  hence  before  any  judgment  can  be  pronounced  upon 
them.  But  for  much  the  larger  part  of  the  extant  literature  this 
process  has  scarcely  begun.  Yet  before  one  tries  to  understand  the 
works  in  question  one  must  possess  them.  But  for  whole  masses 
of  the  literature  we  have  only  inadequate  texts,  while  for  other 
sections,  as  the  Christian  writers  from  the  fourth  century  on,  the 
texts  are  inaccessible.  To  secure  these,  Greek  philology  has  striven 
with  vigor  and  success.  But  not  all  the  civilized  nations  have 
supplied  large  numbers  of  willing  and  able  collaborators  for  the 
undertaking;  and  furthermore,  precisely  from  the  most  important 
periods  only  too  many  works  are  lost ;  these  it  is  necessary  to  restore 
so  far  as  we  have  the  power — so  far  as,  with  our  best  efforts,  the 
task  is  not  utterly  hopeless.  Much,  indeed,  has  already  been  accom- 
plished, yet  the  fact  remains  that  not  even  the  fragments  have  been 
completely  assembled;  and  this  is  only  the  first  step.  For  the  his- 
tory of  literature  the  second  step  is  to  trace  out  subsequent  influ- 
ences, and  it  is  almost  more  important  than  the  other.  Still  fur- 
ther, Greek  literature  is  all-embracing;  it  will  not  do  to  limit  the 
term  to  belles-lettres  (a  conception  for  which  the  Greeks  had  no 
equivalent),  and  to  exclude  the  special  sciences.  But  now  we  must 
remember  that  the  works  on  medicine,  astronomy,  and  mechanics 


166      ULRICH  VON  WILAMOWITZ-MOELLENDORFF 

cannot  be  understood  without  a  knowledge  of  these  sciences.  Here 
the  collaboration  of  various  specially  trained  investigators  is  de- 
manded— something  long  needed,  but  now,  thank  Heaven !  no  longer 
wanting.  The  culture  of  the  twenty-first  century  will  look  down 
with  pity,  let  us  hope,  on  the  small  extent  of  our  present  knowledge, 
and  will  rectify  many  of  our  judgments ;  but  it  unquestionably  will 
hand  on  to  its  future  more  to  do  than,  under  the  most  favorable 
circumstances,  its  advantage  will  amount  to  in  comparison  with  us. 
True  it  is,  the  feeling  of  one's  own  inadequacy  in  the  face  of  such 
a  task  is  not  quieted  by  the  thought  that  in  any  case  the  problem 
can  at  the  moment  obtain  but  an  inadequate  solution;  yet  to  the 
man  who  reads  as  well  as  the  man  who  writes  we  may  apply  the 
utterance  of  Hippolyte  Taine — who  knew  what  it  was  to  read  and 
write:  'The  keenest  pleasure  of  a  toiling  spirit  lies  in  the  thought 
of  the  toil  hereafter  to  be  accomplished  by  others. ' 

It  could  not  be  otherwise  than  that,  in  accordance  with  the  extant 
materials,  the  treatment  of  them  should  be  widely  varied;  for  on 
the  one  hand  it  is  impossible  to  set  such  works  as  we  have  constantly 
in  the  centre,  so  as  to  make  the  accidental  circumstance  of  their 
preservation  more  or  less  determine  the  question  of  relative  impor- 
tance; and,  on  the  other  hand,  investigation  has  not  everywhere 
managed  to  survey  the  motive  forces  to  such  an  extent  that  one 
may  find  an  historical  thread  by  which  to  order  all  the  particulars. 
The  single  principle  of  following  each  literary  type  separately 
would,  of  course,  preserve  unity,  but  this  very  procedure  would 
completely  involve  us  again  in  the  ancient  schematism.  Accord- 
ingly, what  would  on  artistic  grounds  be  the  only  satisfying  method 
has  here  been  renounced,  and  the  attempt  has  been  made  to  treat 
each  period  in  accordance  with  the  status  of  the  materials  and  of 
our  knowledge.  If  this  procedure  seems  to  subordinate  the  classi- 
cal period  as  compared  with  what  is  subsequent  thereto,  let  the 
reader  recall  not  merely  the  sum  total  of  the  extant  writings,  and 
the  length  of  the  periods,  but  also  the  fact  that  the  opposite  injus- 
tice has  only  too  long  prevailed. 

The  periods  are  automatically  divided  according  to  the  great 
sections  of  history.  The  first  is  the  Hellenic,  from  about  700  B.  C. 
to  the  Persian  wars,  to  which  is  attached  the  Attic,  delimited  about 
the  year  320  by  the  death  of  Alexander,  Aristotle,  and  Demosthenes. 
If  we  speak  of  the  fourth  century,  the  age  embraces  but  eighty 
years,  and  the  same  is  true  of  the  fifth.  The  glory  of  Athens  was 
brief.  Then  come  the  three  Hellenistic  centuries,  separated  from  one 
another  by,  say,  the  year  222  (beginning  of  Polybius),  the  year  133 


EXTENT  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  167 

(beginning  of  revolutionary  times  at  Rome),  and  the  year  30  (con- 
quest of  Alexandria).  The  differences  between  the  centuries  are 
easily  felt ;  but  precisely  for  this  period  the  historical  sequence  has 
had  to  be  abandoned.  The  fourth,  or  Roman,  period,  down  to  Con- 
stantine,  is  the  one  of  which  we  have  most  knowledge.  Following 
this  must  come  the  period  of  the  Eastern  Roman  Empire,  down  to 
the  invasion  by  Islam  and  the  outbreak  of  iconoclasm  (for  from  then 
on  the  continuity  is  quite  interrupted),  or  at  least  down  to  the  year 
529  and  the  closing  of  the  school  of  Plato  (for  the  age  of  Justinian 
already  has  a  rich,  new  life).  Meanwhile  the  information  of  those 
who  do  the  reporting,  and  the  economy  of  our  account,  have  per- 
mitted only  a  glance  at  the  latter  end  of  the  Hellenic  literary  types. 
This  procedure  is  in  so  far  justified  that  antiquity  in  very  truth 
passed  away  with  the  downfall  of  the  Empire  and  the  state  reli- 
gion. 


XIII 

THE  'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE1 

By  Gilbert  Murray 

The  object  of  us  Greek  scholars  is  to  find  out  all  we  can  about 
ancient  Greece  and — still  more  important — to  understand  what  we 
find.  For  the  first  part  of  this  work  we  have  various  instruments. 
The  inscribed  stones,  immense  in  numbers,  which  happen  to  have 
weathered  the  ages  and  come  down  to  us  in  a  legible  condition. 
The  surface  of  the  earth  and  sea  in  Greek  regions,  which  naturally 
has  changed  far  less  than  the  human  institutions.  The  inscribed 
coins,  which,  by  all  kinds  of  strange  fates,  have  been  neither  decom- 
posed nor  melted,  but  have  turned  up  still  more  or  less  decipherable 
and  charged  with  history.  The  fragments  of  papyri,  preserved  by 
the  accident  of  the  Egyptian  climate  and  other  chances,  which  give 
us  bits  of  letters  and  of  books  which  may  have  been  handled,  if  not 
by  Plato,  at  least  by  Callimachus  or  Didymus  or  Mark  Antony. 
Lastly,  the  customs  and  rites  and  ways  of  life  of  various  races  of 
mankind  still  existing  in  a  savage  or  primitive  state,  which  throw 
light  on  the  condition  from  which  the  Greeks  emerged  as  they  be- 
came Greeks,  and  which  enable  us  to  understand  vast  masses  of 
ancient  myth  and  custom  which  seemed  meaningless  before.  One 
could  enumerate  other  instruments  too.  But  the  fact  remains  that 
by  far  the  greatest  part  of  our  knowledge  of  the  ancient  Greeks 
comes  from  the  books  which  they  wrote,  and  which  have  come  down 
to  us  by  a  long  process  of  handing-on  from  generation  to  genera- 
tion: traditio  is  the  Latin  word,  paradosis  the  Greek.  That  is  to 
say :  The  books  which  we  now  possess  are  those  which,  for  one  reason 
or  another,  have  been  constantly  copied  and  re-copied,  and  never 
allowed  quietly  to  pass  on  to  the  natural  end  of  books  and  men. 
It  is  not  only  that  they  were  always  considered  worth  reading  by 
somebody ;  it  is  that  somebody  was  always  willing  to  take  the  great 

[i  From  the  Yale  Review  2.  215-233.  The  author  of  the  article  is  Regius 
Professor  of  Greek  in  the  University  of  Oxford.  In  this  country  he  is  best 
known  for  his  gifts  as  a  translator  of  Euripides. — Editor.] 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  169 

trouble  of  writing  them  out  again.  That  process  is  the  literary 
'tradition,'  and  it  is  that  that  I  propose  to  discuss  in  the  present 
paper. 

I  will  first  make  some  general  comments  on  the  characteristics  of 
the  literary  tradition,  as  compared  with  our  other  sources  of  knowl- 
edge. I  will  then  consider  the  main  defects  in  the  tradition  as  a 
process :  I  mean,  the  question  how  far  the  things  that  are  preserved 
are  preserved  accurately;  and  lastly,  the  defects  in  the  content  of 
the  tradition,  that  is :  what  important  classes  of  books  are  not 
preserved  at  all,  and  for  what  reason. 

First,  then,  the  general  characteristics.  Obviously  the  literary 
tradition,  where  it  exists,  is  much  fuller,  more  intelligible,  more 
explanatory,  than  our  other  sources  of  knowledge.  This  is  almost 
too  obvious  to  dwell  upon.  At  the  very  beginning  of  Hicks'  inscrip- 
tions you  find  the  bases  of  the  pillars  of  the  temple  at  Ephesus 
inscribed:  "Baatkevs  KpoZaos  dviOrjKev' — and  how  interesting  it  is! 
But,  without  Herodotus,  not  only  could  the  inscription  never  have 
been  read;  without  Herodotus,  it  would  not  have  been  in  the  least 
interesting  if  it  had  been  read.  Bao-iAevs  Kpoto-os  would  have  been 
nothing  to  us.  Think  again  of  the  condition  of  our  Cretan  remains 
unaccompanied  by  literature.  How  rich  they  are,  and  how  enig- 
matical! A  story  is  there  waiting  to  be  told,  but  there  is — so  far 
at  least — no  literature  to  tell  it.  Think  how  all  our  knowledge 
would  be  trebled  if  Dr.  Evans  unearthed  for  us  the  feeblest  frag- 
ment of  a  Minoan  historian. 

It  is  as  a  rule  literature  that  explains;  consequently  it  is  to  a 
large  extent  literature  that  gives  interest.  This,  however,  is  not  a 
question  of  literature  as  against  archaeology ;  it  is  merely  a  question 
of  art  against  that  which  is  not  art.  The  Hermes  of  Praxiteles  does 
not  wait  for  a  literary  text  to  explain  or  illuminate  him.  It  is  he 
who  explains  and  illuminates  an  otherwise  quite  uninteresting  text 
in  Pausanias.  But,  in  the  main,  as  compared  with  the  great  mass 
of  archaeological  evidence,  the  literary  remains  are  what  we  call 
art — that  indescribable  thing  which  aims  at  stirring  our  interest 
and  sense  of  beauty.  And  this  brings  me  to  the  second  character- 
istic of  literary  tradition. 

It  is  what  we,  in  our  rather  stupid  phraseology,  call  'idealized.' 
In  Greek  it  is  occupied  with  the  kalon  rather  more  than  the  anan- 
kaion,  with  what  you  aspire  to  do  rather  than  what  you  have  got 
to  do.  Of  course  there  are  degrees.  In  the  higher  poetry,  as  in  the 
higher  art,  to  kalon  has  things  all  its  own  way.  And  the  same  in 
most  philosophy.     Whatever  historical  conclusions  can  be  drawn 


170  GILBERT  MURRAY 

from  the  Agamemnon  or  the  Symposium,  it  is  quite  clear  that 
Aeschylus  and  Plato  were  not  chiefly  concerned  in  depicting  con- 
temporary facts.  They  were  chiefly  concerned  with  thinking  and 
expressing  the  highest  thoughts  in  their  power;  whereas  the  man 
who  inscribed  the  Erechtheum  accounts  was  mainly  concerned  with 
getting  the  figures  right — and  did  not  bother  about  to  kalon  except 
for  cutting  his  letters  well. 

What  of  history?  According  to  some  conceptions  of  history,  to 
anankaion  would  be  absolutely  paramount.  '  The  task  of  history  is 
to  investigate  how  things  happened,'  according  to  Ranke's  dictum. 
But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  I  do  not  see  how  there  can  be  any  doubt 
that  the  works  of  all  ancient  historians — Thucydides  as  much  as 
any — are  works  of  art.  To  kalon  has  an  enormous  sway  over  their 
minds.  I  do  not  wish  to  raise  the  question  whether  the  search  for 
beauty  and  the  search  for  truth  are  irreconcilable,  either  ultimately 
or  in  ordinary  practice.  Thucydides,  the  most  accurate  and  scien- 
tific of  ancient  historians,  probably  possesses  also  the  most  terrible 
emotional  and  artistic  power.  But  I  do  suggest  strongly  that  in  all 
ancient  literary  history  there  is  a  great  deal  of  selection  and  ideali- 
zation, a  striving  for  to  kalon,  which  removes  it  from  the  sphere  of 
mere  recorded  fact.  Do  you  want  an  example — a  gross  example? 
Take  the  fact  that  almost  all  ancient  historians,  in  their  finished 
work,  refuse  to  give  documents  and  speeches  in  the  authentic  words, 
but  re-write  them  deliberately  in  a  way  that  will  harmonize  with 
the  style  and  tenor  of  their  own  work. 

Our  ancient  literature,  then,  gives  on  the  whole  far  more  of  the 
kalon  than  the  anankaion.  That  makes  the  record  a  little  one- 
sided, and  explains  the  extraordinary  interest  which  we  tend  to  take 
in  those  few  books  that  belong  to  the  other  tendency,  which  are  not 
lofty,  not  idealized,  and  have  the  touch  of  common  life  in  them. 
That  is  why  we  are  interested  in  the  tract  of  the  Old  Oligarch  on 
The  Constitution  of  Athens  and  his  remarks  about  the  lodginghouse- 
keeper's  vote  and  the  cabman's  vote.  It  is  why  we  revel  in  the 
fragments  of  familiar  history  that  can  be  extracted  from  Aris- 
tophanes (though  Aristophanes  cared  little  enough  for  to  anan- 
kaion; he  pursued  to  kalon  like  any  other  artist,  only  his  kalon  took 
the  comic  form).  It  is  why  we  accept  with  gratitude  even  such  a 
child  of  the  mud  as  Herondas.  These  things  help  to  complete  our 
historical  knowledge,  and  to  make  it  alive.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
fact  always  remains  that  they  are  valuable,  not  for  themselves,  but 
only  allou  heneka,  for  the  sake  of  something  else;  for  the  sake, 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  171 

ultimately,  of  that  very  selected  and  idealized  literature  against 
which  they  are  in  conscious  revolt. 

These  two  qualities,  the  full  and  explanatory  character  of  the 
literary  tradition  and  its  pursuit  of  to  kalon,  must  be  set  against 
one  clear  inferiority  which  belongs  to  it  as  compared  with  archaeo- 
logical evidence.  It  is  richer,  but  it  is  less  trustworthy.  Coins,  and 
even  inscriptions,  can  be  forged;  but  where  you  do  get  a  contem- 
porary inscription  or  coin,  the  information  which  it  gives  you  is 
final.  Even  in  points  of  language  it  is  the  same.  Most  of  our 
knowledge  of  Attic  forms  comes  from  the  manuscripts  and  the 
grammarians ;  but  they  are  not  final  authorities.  If  they  tell  us  to 
write  Troizen,  and  all  the  contemporary  stones  write  Trozen,  we 
know  that  the  matter  is  settled.    Trozen  must  be  right. 

So  much  for  the  general  characteristics  of  the  literature  as  against 
the  other  evidence.  Let  us  now  consider  how  far  the  paradosis,  or 
traditio,  of  the  literature,  has  been  an  accurate  process.  "We  can 
consider  first  the  comparative  soundness  or  corruptness  of  our 
manuscript  texts  in  the  matter  of  mere  wording,  and  secondly  the 
larger  changes  of  form  which  belong  to  what  is  called  the  higher 
criticism. 

As  to  the  corruption  of  manuscripts,  one  important  fact  has  come 
out  clearly  during  the  last  twenty  years.  It  is  that  on  the  whole 
the  handing-on  of  our  classical  texts  from  Alexandrian  times  to  the 
present  has  been  astonishingly  exact.  I  am  referring  here  to  verbal 
accuracy,  to  accuracy  in  transmitting  the  actual  grammata  or 
written  signs  from  manuscript  to  manuscript  down  to  the  twelfth 
or  thirteenth  century.  The  evidence  is  in  the  papyri  and  ostraka 
and  a  few  fragments  of  very  ancient  manuscripts  or  palimpsests. 
Let  us  take  instances.  Our  oldest  regular  manuscript  of  Plato  was 
written  in  the  year  895  A.  D.,  say  1250  years  after  Plato's  death. 
In  1891  Flinders  Petrie  discovered  a  large  papyrus  fragment  of 
the  Phaedo,  which  was  written  in  the  third  century  B.  C. — very 
likely  in  the  lifetime  of  people  who  had  seen  Plato.  Here  was  a 
test  case  for  the  accuracy  of  the  paradosis.  The  papyrus  might 
well  have  shown  that  our  text  of  the  Phaedo  was  a  mass  of  mistakes 
or  interpolations.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  differences  between  the 
traditional  text  and  the  papyrus  were  almost  negligible — in  that 
particular  case  they  affected  chiefly  the  order  of  the  words — and 
where  they  occurred,  the  papyrus  seemed  most  often  to  be  in  the 
wrong. 

Again,  there  are  many  fragments  of  Euripides  preserved  on 


172  GILBERT  MURRAY 

papyri  or  ostraka.  In  the  preface  to  my  first  volume,  I  mentioned 
fourteen,  to  which  one  or  two  more  must  now  be  added.  Of  course 
the  passages  so  preserved  are  mostly  short.  But  the  total  of  lines 
covered  is  very  considerable.  Now,  how  many  places  are  there 
where  the  papyri  or  ostraka  give  an  absolutely  new  right  reading? 
I  mean,  one  which  is  preserved  in  no  manuscript,  and  has  not  been 
reached  by  conjecture  ?  It  seems  extraordinary,  but  I  believe  there 
are  only  two  places — Phoenissae  1036  and  1101.  And  even  those 
two  cases  of  failure  are  almost  a  testimony  to  the  general  accuracy 
of  the  tradition.  In  the  latter  a  papyrus  gives  us  £vvfj\(/av,  'they 
joined,'  instead  of  twrjxf/ev,  'he  joined';  and  no  one  happened  to 
have  made  that  conjecture,  although  they  easily  might,  if  they  had 
studied  the  scholia,  which  evidently  imply  a  plural.  In  the  former, 
1036,  there  are  two  short  lines,  Irfiw  fiodv,  Irjtov  fieXos,  where  for  metri- 
cal reasons  we  need  an  iambus  more  in  each  line.  They  are  ordinary 
iambic  dimeters.  They  mean,  you  see,  'the  cry  of  ie,  the  music  of 
ie' — ie  being  one  of  the  regular  cries  of  wailing.  People  emended 
by  doubling  the  words  fiodv  and  fte'Xos.  The  scholiast  observed  that 
'It  is  found  in  the  poets  that  way,  ie  ie,  just  like  id  id.'  Yet  by 
some  accident  we  never  thought  of  emending  the  line  to  irj^iov  fiodv, 
lT)irjiov  /u.c'Xos — 'the  cry  of  ie-ie,  the  music  of  ie-ie.'  Clearly  that  is 
what  the  scholiast  meant.  And  it  so  happens  that  one  of  the 
Oxyrhynchus  papyri  gives  it  so.    Of  course  that  is  right. 

Let  me  take  two  more  instances  to  show  how  steady  the  tradition 
has  been.  From  the  study  of  our  fourteenth  century  manuscript 
L,  Wilamowitz  came  to  the  conclusion  that  L's  group  of  manu- 
scripts was  descended  from  an  archetype  which  contained  all  the 
plays  of  Euripides,  not  merely  those  selected  for  educational  pur- 
poses, without  any  notes,  but  with  variant  readings  written  above 
the  line.  When  Grenfell  and  Hunt  discovered  the  Eypsipyle 
papyrus,  it  proved  to  be  a  manuscript  without  notes  but  with 
variant  readings  written  above  the  line,  and  of  course  the  Hypsipyle 
is  one  of  the  unselected  plays. 

A  last  instance  of  the  same  steadiness.    In  Phoenissae  131 — 

rbv  8'  e£a/A£i/3ovT  ox>x  opas  AipKT^  vSwp ; 

See  you  not  him  crossing  Dirce's  water? — 

a  Byzantine  group  of  manuscripts  add  at  the  end  of  the  line  a 
gloss, '  Xoxayov ' — '  see  you  not  that  captain  ? '  A  late  Byzantine  gloss, 
critics  used  to  say.  But  on  a  certain  very  ill- written  ostrakon  in 
the  British  Museum,  dating  from  the  second  century,  you  have  the 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  173 

word  Xoxayov  already  there.  It  is  a  mistake.  A  mere  gloss.  But 
it  was  in  the  text  by  about  150  A.  D.,  and  has  been  religiously 
copied  by  a  whole  chain  of  scribes. 

Of  course  humanum  est  errare.  All  manuscripts  have  lots  of 
mistakes  in  them.  What  I  am  here  comparing  with  the  papyri  is 
not  the  text  of  any  particular  manuscript,  but  the  text  that  results 
from  the  critical  examination  of  all  the  manuscripts  by  a  good 
scholar  using  his  knowledge  as  best  he  can.  When  by  criticism  you 
succeed  in  finding  out  what  the  '  tradition '  really  is,  that  tradition 
proves  to  be  surprisingly  accurate. 

But  here  comes  an  important  qualification.  This  evidence  of  the 
papyri  only  takes  us  back,  at  earliest,  to  the  Alexandrian  age. 
From  the  second  century  B.  C.  onwards,  the  tradition  has  been  care- 
ful; but  before  that  thousand  years  of  care,  there  had  been  some 
two  hundred  of  carelessness.  The  great  Alexandrian  scholars  were 
probably  almost  the  first  people  in  the  world  to  understand  the 
meaning  of  exactness  in  preserving  an  ordinary  secular  text.  Some 
of  the  papyri  themselves  show  us  how  careless  a  pre- Alexandrian 
text  could  be.  Our  scholia  to  the  tragedians  show  that  the  greatest 
of  our  difficulties  and  corruptions  were  mostly  already  there  when 
the  commentaries  were  made.  Again  and  again  the  critical  editor 
has  to  make  his  footnote :  * corruptela  iam  Didymo  antiquior.'  And 
if  it  comes  to  that,  general  considerations  of  the  history  of  Greek 
literature  would  have  led  us  to  the  same  conclusion.  It  is  late  in 
the  day  that  a  man  turns  from  the  natural  conception  that  his  book 
ought  to  be  as  good  and  full  as  possible,  to  the  scholarly  and  self- 
denying  conception  that  it  ought  to  be  exactly  what  the  writer  left 
it. 

By  the  time  of  the  Alexandrians,  when  our  tradition  began, 
manuscripts  were  often  already  badly  corrupted.  An  instance  of 
what  I  mean  can  be  found  in  some  of  the  latest  plays  of  Euripides. 
Our  text  of  the  Phoenissae  is  probably  nearly  as  good  as  the  text 
that  was  edited  by  Aristophanes  of  Byzantium.  Yet  the  play  that 
we  have  is,  in  the  opinion  of  most  critics,  a  perfect  mass  of  inter- 
polation. It  was  acted,  no  doubt,  again  and  again,  in  Athens  and 
in  less  cultured  places,  during  the  fourth  and  third  centuries,  and 
the  only  copy  the  Alexandrians  could  get  was  one  that  had  been 
exposed — like  most  plays  that  have  life  in  them — to  the  improve- 
ments and  additions  of  the  stage-manager.  The  same  is  hardly  less 
true  of  the  Orestes.  The  Iphigenia  in  Aulis  happens  to  have  some 
of  its  history  recorded,  so  we  can  speak  of  it  with  more  certainty. 
True,  the  archetype  of  our  two  manuscripts  was  defective  at  the 


174  GILBERT  MURRAY 

end ;  the  manuscripts  themselves  say  so ;  and  the  end  that  we  now 
have  is  apparently  work  of  the  early  Renaissance.  In  that  respect 
the  Alexandrians  were  better  off.  But  for  the  rest  of  the  play  how 
does  it  stand  ?  We  know  that  the  Iphigenia  in  Aulis  was  produced 
and  prepared  for  the  stage  by  Euripides  the  younger  after  his 
father's  death.  An  inscription  tells  us  that '  The  Iphigenia  of  Eurip- 
ides'— very  probably  this  play — was  acted  again  in  341  B.  C,  and 
that  the  actor  Neoptolemus  received  a  prize  for  it.  Doubtless  it 
was  acted  more  often  than  that.  And  the  version  that  has  come 
down  to  us  bears  the  natural  traces  of  this  history.  It  has  two 
distinct  and  scarcely  compatible  prologues.  It  makes  the  impres- 
sion, upon  practically  all  scholars  who  have  studied  it,  of  contain- 
ing masses  of  work  by  different  hands.  Unfortunately  we  have  no 
scholia  to  the  Iphigenia  in  Aulis.  But  we  may  be  fairly  sure  that, 
when  the  Alexandrian  scholars  set  to  work  to  collect  the  works  of 
Euripides,  the  only  copy  they  could  get  of  this  famous  play  was 
one  already  badly  knocked  about  by  the  actors.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  both  the  extant  prologues  are  quoted  by  writers  of  the  genera- 
tion after  Aristotle.  The  mischief  had  begun  as  early  as  that.  In 
the  case  of  the  Rhesus,  there  were  actually  three  prologues  going 
in  Alexandrian  times.  The  Rhesus  question  is  too  complicated  to 
discuss  at  length.  But  it  is  clear  that  the  Alexandrians  could  not 
get  hold  of  a  copy  that  satisfied  them. 

Again,  what  are  we  to  make  of  such  a  fact  as  the  comparative 
condition  of  the  several  Homeric  hymns  ?  The  Hymn  to  Aphrodite 
is  excellently  preserved ;  the  Hymn  to  Apollo  is  in  a  state  of  desper- 
ate confusion.  But  the  confusion  is  not  such  as  comes  from  faulty 
manuscript  tradition.  It  does  not  yield  to  criticism  and  emenda- 
tion. It  goes  back  to  the  time  when  the  old  epic  literature  was  but 
newly  dead,  and  its  fragments  were  collected  and  formed  into  such 
wholes  or  attempts  at  wholes  as  circumstances  allowed,  probably  by 
people  who  had  as  yet  no  particular  sense  of  scholarship. 

To  sum  up :  In  the  cases  where  ancient  books  or  parts  of  books 
have  been  preserved  to  us  entire,  and  where  our  manuscripts  are 
of  good  average  quality,  we  find  that  the  tradition,  from  Alexan- 
drian times  on,  has  been  to  a  surprising  degree  careful  and  trust- 
worthy. I  leave  aside,  of  course,  special  cases  of  bad  or  mutilated 
manuscripts;  anthologies  in  which  the  quotations  were  modified  in 
order  to  stand  without  their  context ;  and  the  handbooks  which  have 
been  systematically  interpolated  and  improved  by  their  owners. 

Let  us  next  consider  the  content  of  the  tradition.    That  is,  how 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  175 

much  of  what  it  tried  to  preserve  has  it  actually  preserved  ?  Here 
we  have  a  very  different  story. 

Take  first  the  kinds  of  literature  of  which  we  seem  to  have  a 
large  stock:  epos,  drama,  oratory,  and  history.  Epic  perhaps  be- 
longed to  very  early  times,  so  that  it  is  not  surprising  that  we  have 
only  two  poems  remaining  out  of  a  whole  wide  literature,  and  those 
in  a  very  late  recension.  Of  lyric  poetry,  too,  we  may  say  that  it 
flourished  chiefly  in  non- Attic  regions,  whereas  our  tradition  has 
its  roots  in  Athens.  So  we  ought  not  to  complain  if  out  of  a  large 
number  of  lyric  poets  the  tradition  has  preserved  complete  poems 
by  only  one,  and  of  him  only  about  a  fifth  part  of  his  whole  writ- 
ings. The  papyri  give  us  a  few  complete  poems  by  another.  As 
for  tragedy,  there  must  have  been,  as  far  as  we  can  calculate,  well 
over  nine  hundred  tragedies  produced  in  Athens ;  we  feel  ourselves 
rich  with  thirty-three  out  of  that  number.  But  that  is  a  vague 
way  of  considering  the  question.  Let  us  take  two  periods  to  com- 
pare with  our  own,  and  to  make  out  how  the  great  losses  took  place. 

"We  have  a  fair  amount  of  evidence  about  the  books  in  the  Alex- 
andrian library:  that  should  be  one  point.  For  another  we  may 
take  the  interesting  Bibliotheca  or  MvptofiifiXov  of  Photius.  Photius 
was  Patriarch  of  Constantinople  from  857  to  879  A.  D.,  and  the 
Bibliotheca  is  a  list,  with  notes  and  epitomes,  of  three  hundred 
books  which  he  had  had  read  to  him.  It  is  dedicated  to  '  his  beloved 
brother  Tarasius. '  Apparently  Photius  was  in  the  habit  of  having 
books  read  aloud  in  his  learned  circle,  where  Tarasius  was  usually 
present.  This  is  a  list  of  books  which  Tarasius  somehow  missed, 
and  is  sent  to  him  on  that  account,  and  also  to  console  him  for  the 
absence  of  Photius  himself  on  an  embassy  to  the  Assyrians — that 
is,  as  Gibbon  said,  to  the  Caliph  of  Bagdad. 

To  take  some  definite  figures,  comparing  first  merely  the  Alex- 
andrians and  ourselves,  and  omitting  Photius  for  the  moment. 
Aeschylus  wrote  ninety  plays ;  the  Alexandrians  possessed  seventy- 
two  of  them;  we  have  seven.  Sophocles  wrote  one  hundred  and 
twenty-three ;  we  do  not  know  the  Alexandrian  number,  but  it  must 
have  been  very  large ;  we  have  seven.  Euripides  wrote  ninety-two ; 
Alexandria  possessed  seventy-eight ;  we  have  nineteen.  Of  Pindar, 
the  Alexandrians  possessed  seventeen  books;  we  have  four,  not 
complete.  Of  Simonides  they  had  a  considerably  larger  number  of 
books,  though  we  cannot  be  sure  of  the  figure;  we  have  none.  Of 
Alcman  they  had  six,  of  Alcaeus  at  least  ten,  of  Sappho  nine ;  we 
have  none.  They  had  twenty-six  books  of  Stesichorus;  we  have 
none.    They  had  the  books  of  Heraclitus,  Empedocles,  Parmenides, 


176  GILBERT  MURRAY 

Anaxagoras.  They  had  the  splendid  mass  of  Chrysippus.  They 
had  Dicaearchus'  Life  of  Hellas;  they  had  the  great  scientific  and 
imaginative  works  of  Eratosthenes;  they  had  the  thirty  books  of 
Ephorus'  universal  history,  the  twelve  books  of  Theopompus' 
Hellenica,  and  the  fifty-six  of  his  Philippica.  Of  all  which  the  tradi- 
tion has  brought  us  nothing.  They  had  great  masses  of  Old  and 
New  Comedy,  of  elegy  and  romance,  of  which  we  possess  only 
fragments. 

I  have  been  considering  only  authors  of  the  first  rank  of  genius 
or  importance.    Even  in  that  region  our  loss  is  overwhelming. 

Now  let  us  turn  to  Photius.  It  so  happens  that  Photius,  in  the 
three  hundred  books  of  the  Bibliotheca,  describes  no  poetry.  It  was 
not  that,  as  a  bishop,  he  disapproved  of  it.  He  speaks  with  respect 
of  various  poets,  and  he  epitomizes  novels  and  romances  with  a 
fulness  that  suggests  enthusiasm.  Of  course  we  must  remember 
that  the  pronunciation  of  Greek  had  completely  changed,  and  that 
the  Byzantines,  having  lost  the  sense  of  quantity,  and  scanning 
only  by  accent,  had  lost  all  that  gives  melody  and  meaning  to  the 
forms  of  ancient  verse.  But  I  think  we  shall  see  later  the  real 
reason  for  Photius'  neglect  of  poetry. 

Of  the  writers  we  have  just  mentioned,  the  only  one  that  comes 
in  Photius'  list  is  Theopompus.  It  is  one  hundred  and  seventy- 
sixth  in  the  list : '  Read,  the  historical  books  of  Theopompus.  Those 
preserved  amount  to  fifty-three.  Even  some  of  the  ancients  said 
that  the  sixth  and  seventh  and  twenty-ninth  and  thirtieth  had 
perished.  And  these  I  have  not  seen,  either.  But  a  certain 
Menophanes — an  ancient  and  not  contemptible  person — in  giving 
an  account  of  Theopompus  says  that  the  twelfth  had  perished  also. 
Yet  we  read  it  together  with  the  others.  The  contents  of  the  twelfth 
are  as  follows  .  .  . '  That  is  one  big  loss  that  has  come  to  us  since 
the  time  of  Photius. 

And  there  are  others.  We  must  remember  that  Photius  mostly 
read  Christian  Fathers,  and  that  the  writers  of  the  Roman  period 
were  for  him  among  the  ancients.  He  had  several  of  them  in  a 
more  complete  state  than  we  have,  Diodorus  for  instance;  but 
those  do  not  affect  our  present  question.  Of  classical  Greek  writers 
he  had  read  Herodotus — without  much  appreciation.  Also  Ctesias, 
in  twenty-four  books,  twenty-three  of  Persica  and  one  of  Indica. 
These  are  known  to  us  only  by  Photius'  epitome.  His  Ctesias 
seems  to  have  been  a  rare  book,  since  he  took  special  pains  with  it, 
just  as  he  did  with  that  twelfth  book  of  Theopompus.  He  had  also 
the  History  of  the  Diadochi  and  the  celebrated  account  of  the  Red 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  177 

Sea  by  the  geographer  Agatharchides :  he  devotes  forty  columns  to 
it.  He  had  apparently  the  history  of  the  Alexandrian  Cephalion. 
But  much  the  greater  hulk  of  his  ancient  literature  consists  in  the 
Attic  orators.  He  had  the  sixty  speeches  of  Antiphon,  twenty-five 
of  them  considered  spurious,  where  we  have  fifteen.  Of  Andocides, 
like  us,  he  had  only  four.  Of  Lysias,  where  we  are  perhaps  almost 
content  with  an  imperfect  thirty-four,  he  had  apparently  four  hun- 
dred and  twenty-five,  of  which  two  hundred  and  thirty-three  were 
considered  spurious.  (If  that  corpus  were  ever  rediscovered,  what 
opportunities  it  would  give  to  our  historians!)  Of  Isaeus  he  had 
sixty-four,  fifty  of  them  genuine;  we  have  ten  and  a  half.  Of 
Isocrates  he  had  sixty,  twenty-eight  of  them  genuine ;  of  Hyperides 
he  had  seventy-seven,  fifty-two  of  them  genuine.  And  so  on.  "We 
have  twenty-one  speeches  of  Isocrates,  and  know  Hyperides  only 
from  the  papyri. 

Masses  of  prose  oratory!  A  great  part  of  it  not  especially  elo- 
quent in  its  form,  most  of  it — to  Photius  at  least — unintelligible  as 
to  its  matter.  That  is  the  chief  treasure  that  he  finds  in  classical 
literature.  If  you  count  the  columns  that  he  devotes  to  his  abstracts 
of  the  various  writers,  they  tell  the  same  tale.  Herodotus  is  dis- 
missed in  about  half  a  column.  Himerius'  Meletai,  or  studies  in 
the  art  of  rhetoric,  are  epitomized  in  sixty-eight  columns.  It  is  the 
usual  phenomenon  of  late  Greek  literature,  the  absorption  of  all 
other  literary  subjects  in  the  all-engrossing  study  of  rhetoric.  It 
is  the  same  tendency  that  has  enriched  us  with  the  vast  unreadable 
mass  of  the  Rhetores  Graeci. 

"What  is  the  meaning  and  the  historical  cause  of  that  tendency? 
For  what  reason  did  sane  human  beings  preserve  sixty-four  speeches 
of  Isaeus,  and  let  Sappho  and  Alcaeus  and  even  nearly  all  Aeschy- 
lus perish?  People  talk  about  certain  alleged  peculiarities  and 
abnormal  sensitivenesses  of  these  late  Greeks.  But  it  is  a  pity  to 
assume  that  human  beings  were  very  unlike  ourselves  merely  be- 
cause they  did  strange  things.  So  often  the  strange  things  they 
did  are  just  what  we  should  have  done  under  the  same  circum- 
stances. 

Greek  antiquity  from  Alexander  onward  had  before  it  a  great 
duty,  and  a  duty  which  it  consciously  realized.  It  had  first  to 
spread,  and  then  to  conserve,  the  highest  civilization  that  mankind 
had  yet  reached.  The  task,  as  we  all  know,  was  too  hard  for  it. 
From  about  the  second  century  A.  D.,  ancient  learning  and  civili- 
zation are  conducting,  not  a  triumphant  progress,  but  a  stubbornly 


178  GILBERT  MURRAY 

defended  retreat.  The  very  feeling  of  defeat  perhaps  sharpened 
men's  devotion  to  the  cause. 

Hellenism  was  based  on  culture;  and  the  great  emblem  and 
instrument  of  that  culture  was  the  Attic  Greek  language.  "We 
often  sneer  at  the  late  Atticists  for  writing  in  an  idiom  which  they 
did  not  speak.  But  they  were  doing  the  right  thing.  The  spoken 
idiom  of  a  Spartan  peasant  still  differed  from  that  of  an  Athenian ; 
both  would  have  difficulty  in  making  themselves  understood  in 
Macedonia.  But  the  language  of  Plato  was  studied  and  under- 
stood by  cultured  men  from  Gades  to  Cappadocia;  and  those  who 
could  write  it  had  a  common  ideal  and  a  common  birthright.  In 
Plutarch's  dialogues  men  from  the  remotest  places  meet  together 
at  Delphi,  a  professor  from  Britain,  a  sophist  from  Sardis,  a 
Roman  official,  a  Boeotian  country  gentleman;  all  can  speak  the 
same  language  and  respond  to  the  same  ideas. 

You  will  say  that  such  an  artificial  state  of  things  could  not 
last?  But  it  did  last.  It  provided  the  world  with  that  extraordi- 
nary chain  of  historians  writing  all  in  practically  the  same  lan- 
guage and  each  with  a  consciousness  of  his  predecessors,  down  to 
Photius  himself,  down  even  to  Eustathius  and  to  people  well  on  this 
side  of  the  Norman  Conquest. 

On  the  other  hand,  to  keep  this  instrument  going,  a  slow  and 
constant  sacrifice  had  to  be  made.  Part  of  the  cargo  was  con- 
stantly thrown  overboard  in  order  to  save  the  rest.  Plutarch  knew 
his  ancient  poets  well.  He  knew  Pindar  in  his  full  condition,  be- 
fore the  selection  that  we  possess  came  into  existence.  But  a 
century  or  so  after  Plutarch  nobody  read  these  difficult  poets. 
Julian,  enthusiast  for  Hellas  as  he  was,  had  read  hardly  any  more 
ancient  poetry  than  we  ourselves.  The  men  who  were  practically 
fighting  for  Hellenism  during  those  centuries  of  tough  decline,  had 
enough  to  do  to  keep  alive  the  bare  necessaries  of  culture.  Knowl- 
edge of  course  was  still  spread  chiefly  by  lectures  and  speeches, 
and  by  reading  aloud.  Civilization  depended  on  the  art  of  speech — 
not  on  what  we  call  rhetoric,  but  on  what  the  ancients  called 
rhetorike;  the  art  of  speaking  clearly,  persuasively,  intelligibly, 
and  of  course  correctly,  so  that  you  should  in  the  first  place  expound 
your  culture  well  to  such  auditors  as  would  listen,  and  in  the  sec- 
ond place  let  them  draw  in  from  your  lips  the  best  possible  imita- 
tion of  the  pure  Attic  spirit. 

The  thing  that  a  man  can  use  in  his  own  life  is,  as  a  rule,  the 
thing  that  attracts  and  interests  him.  That  is  why  the  late  Greeks 
read  Hyperides  and  Isaeus  and  the  private  speeches  of  Demos- 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  179 

thenes  in  preference  to  Aeschylus  and  Alcman.  It  is  why,  when 
they  did  read  tragedy,  they  vastly  preferred  Euripides  to  Aeschy- 
lus, though,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  having  no  sense  of  drama  left,  they 
preferred  to  read  him  in  extracts  in  an  anthology.  That  is  why  our 
tradition  has  so  ruthlessly  left  most  of  the  old  poets  to  perish. 

But  the  retreat  took  another  form  also.  Let  me  quote  as  typical 
some  sentences  from  the  preface  of  the  physician  Oribasius  to  his 
Epitome  of  Galen:  'Your  command,  Most  Divine  Emperor,  that  I 
should  reduce  to  a  smaller  compass  the  medical  works  of  the  admir- 
able Galen,  has  found  in  me  enthusiastic  obedience.  For  people 
undertake  this  profession,  as  Galen  himself  says,  who  have  neither 
the  proper  talents  nor  the  proper  age;  often  they  have  not  even 
begun  the  simplest  education  (ta  prota  mathemata),  and  conse- 
quently cannot  understand  properly  a  systematic  treatise  (tous 
kata  diexodon  logons).  What  I  am  now  about  to  write  will  suffice 
for  them;  it  will  take  a  shorter  time  to  learn,  and  it  will  be  easier 
to  understand,  for  I  undertake  that  my  reduction  of  the  style  to 
conciseness  will  never  result  in  obscurity.' 

Oribasius  addressed  his  book  to  Julian  (362  A.  D.).  That  is  a 
typical  date,  though  many  literary  subjects  had  been  epitomized 
long  before.  The  seven  plays  of  Aeschylus  were  apparently  selected 
about  then ;  with  the  result  that  afterwards  nobody  read  anything 
beyond  the  seven.  The  same  with  the  seven  of  Sophocles,  and  the 
ten  (or  nine)  of  Euripides,  though  in  the  last  case  a  large  fragment 
of  an  old  uncommented  and  unselected  Euripidis  Opera  Omnia 
happens  to  have  survived  also.  Afterwards  these  selections  were 
reduced  to  three  plays  out  of  each  tragedian.  Four  books  out  of 
the  seventeen  books  of  Pindar  had  been  selected  and  fitted  with  a 
commentary  rather  earlier.  The  old  elegiac  poets  seem  to  have 
been  treated  in  a  different  and  less  satisfactory  way.  A  miscel- 
laneous expurgated  collection  seems  to  have  been  made,  and  passed 
current  under  the  name  of  Theognis.  There  is  no  need  to  multiply 
instances.  The  principle  is  always  the  same.  The  text  is  selected 
from  one  of  the  old  complete  text  editions;  the  commentary  is 
abridged  from  the  sungrammata  and  hupomnemata  of  scholars  of 
the  great  Roman  period,  from  Didymus  to  Herodian. 

The  clue  to  the  matter  is  education.  The  task  of  keeping  up  the 
culture  of  the  world  has  become  a  hard  burden.  Few  men  are 
reading  the  classics  freely,  for  the  mere  joy  of  the  thing.  The 
classics  are  for  youths  to  learn  in  the  schools  and  universities,  not 
because  they  like  it,  but  because  it  is  good  for  them.    What  the 


180  GILBERT  MURRAY 

cultured  world  really  cares  for — apart  from  the  maintenance  of 
orthodoxy — is  the  maintenance  of  Attic. 

The  predominance  of  education  explains  another  fact  about  late 
Greek  literature.  The  educational  profession  is  one  possessed  of 
extraordinary  virtues,  compared  with  most  other  professions;  but 
it  has  its  weaknesses  too.  And  one  of  the  chief  of  them  is  a  ten- 
dency to  pretend  to  knowledge  which  it  does  not  possess.  Late 
Greek  literature  is  full  of  books  which — though  no  doubt  written 
innocently  enough — obtained  long  life  and  popularity  because  they 
enabled  teachers  to  make  a  great  show  of  erudition.  First  of  all, 
the  anthologies.  Many  excellent  fourth-century  writers  throw 
about  with  a  free  hand  their  quotations  from  ancient  literature; 
but  we  find  on  examination  that  nearly  all  their  quotations  occur 
also  in  the  anthologies  of  Stobaeus  and  Orion.  Again,  think  what 
a  display  could  be  made  by  any  one  with  a  good  memory  who  had 
read  Athenaeus.  He  would  be  equipped  with  anecdotes  and  quota- 
tions from  all  the  most  abstruse  and  curious  parts  of  ancient  litera- 
ture. One  strange  book  which  Photius  read  with  much  interest 
seems  almost  to  have  been  specially  written  for  this  particular 
fraudulent  purpose.  It  is  the  Koine  Historie  of  a  certain  Ptole- 
maios,  Ptolemaiou  tou  Hephaistionos — whatever  exactly  that  geni- 
tive means.  For  some  people  think  he  was  the  father,  not  the  son, 
of  Hephaestion;  and  Tzetzes  thinks  he  was  Hephaestion  himself. 
Ptolemaios  was  a  writer  belonging  to  a  very  good  period,  the  sec- 
ond half  of  the  first  century  A.  D.  The  book,  known  to  us  only 
from  Photius,  consisted  of  anecdotes  from  extraordinarily  abstruse 
sources,  generally  professing  either  to  give  information  about 
things  no  one  could  know  or  else  to  contradict  the  ordinary  received 
tradition.  He  may  really  have  been  an  eccentric  man  of  amazing 
erudition,  but  Hercher,  who  has  studied  him  critically,  prefers  the 
alternative  of  regarding  him  as  an  '  unverschamter  Schwindler.' 
The  important  point  for  us  is  that  such  a  book  should  have  lived  on 
and  been  popular. 

Education  and  the  needs  of  education  in  a  world  where  intellect 
is  decaying  and  knowledge  gradually  growing  less — these  are  the 
guiding  conditions  of  the  paradosis.  And  if  we  reflect  for  a  few 
minutes  on  that  fact,  we  shall  reach  a  rather  important  and  inter- 
esting conclusion. 

Of  what  sort  are  the  books  that  education  specially  produces  and 
selects  ?  "We  ought  to  know,  though  we  must  remember  that  we  live 
in  an  age  when  education  is  enlightened  and  progressive  and 
daring;  in  the  centuries  we  are  now  considering,  from  the  second 


'TRADITION'  OF  GREEK  LITERATURE  181 

to  the  ninth,  education  was  in  a  state  of  slow  decay,  it  was  fright- 
ened, conservative,  and  unhopeful. 

First,  education  selects  the  undoubted  classics;  not  specially 
because  anybody  likes  them,  but  because  everybody  approves  of 
them.  They  read  Shakespeare  at  Amelia  Sedley's  school,  because 
it  was  right,  though  they  doubtless  left  out  a  great  part  of  him, 
and  did  not  much  like  what  remained.  Our  Greek  paradosis  has 
duly  preserved  Homer  and  Plato,  Demosthenes  and  a  good  deal  of 
the  canonical  Attic  writers.  It  has  preserved  a  certain  selection 
of  Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  and  Euripides.  Doubtless  it  was  actuated 
more  by  a  sense  of  duty  than  by  genuine  taste ;  but  in  any  case  it 
clearly  did  right,  and  we  ought  to  be  thankful  that  it  had  a  sense 
of  duty.  Secondly,  education  selects  and  produces  handbooks  and 
aids  to  knowledge.  I  need  not  dwell  on  the  extent  to  which  these 
bulk  in  our  tradition.  Thirdly,  if  it  goes  further,  if  it  goes  beyond 
the  indubitable  classic  and  the  mere  text-book,  it  tends  to  choose 
what  is  correct,  obvious,  and  sober.  (When  I  say  correct,  I  do  not 
necessarily  mean  correct  in  morals.  A  work  may  be  considerably 
improper  provided  that  it  is  sanctioned  by  antiquity ;  Aristophanes 
held  his  place  in  Constantinople  as  the  Elizabethans  do  with  us.) 
It  avoids  the  kind  of  writing  about  which  there  tend  to  be  very 
different  opinions,  which  seems  to  one  man  inspired,  and  to  another 
utterly  silly.  It  avoids  literature  that  has  a  special  personal  quality, 
it  avoids  the  intensely  imaginative,  the  enthusiastic,  the  rebellious. 
It  is  guided  by  the  respectable  man;  it  shuns  the  saint  and  the 
bohemian. 

The  importance  of  this  consideration  is,  I  think,  very  great. 
When  one  reads  accounts  in  text-books  of  the  characteristics  of  the 
Greek  mind — its  statuesque  quality,  its  love  of  proportion  and  order 
and  common  sense,  its  correct  rhetoric  and  correct  taste,  its  anthro- 
pomorphism and  care  for  form,  and  all  those  other  virtues  which 
sometimes  seem,  when  added  together,  to  approach  so  dangerously 
near  the  total  of  dull  correctness  and  spiritual  vacuity, — it  is  well  to 
remember  that  the  description  applies,  not  to  what  the  ancient 
Greeks  wrote,  but  to  what  the  late  Roman  and  Byzantine  scholars 
preserved. 

Suppose  it  had  been  a  little  otherwise.  Suppose  that  as  well  as 
Aristotle 's  defense  of  slavery  we  had  the  writings  of  his  opponents, 
the  philosophers  who  maintained  that  slavery  was  contrary  to 
nature.  Suppose  that,  to  compare  with  Plato's  contemptuous  ref- 
erences to  the  Orphics,  we  had  some  of  that '  crowd  of  books '  which 
he  speaks  of.    Suppose  instead  of  Philodemus  we  had  all  Heraclitus 


182  GILBERT  MURRAY 

and  Empedocles  and  the  early  Pythagoreans.  Suppose  we  had 
Antisthenes  and  the  first  Cynics,  the  barefooted  denouncers  of  sin 
and  rejectors  of  civilization.  Suppose  we  had  that  great  monu- 
ment of  bitter  eloquence  and  scorn  of  human  greatness  applied  to 
history,  the  Philippica  of  Theopompus.  Suppose  we  had  the  great 
democracy  of  the  fifth  century  represented,  not  by  its  opponents, 
but  by  the  philosophers  who  believed  in  it — by  Protagoras,  say, 
and  Thrasymachus.  Suppose  that  we  had  more  of  the  women 
writers,  Sappho  above  all  and  Corinna  and  Nossis  and  Leontion. 
Suppose  we  even  had  more  literature  like  that  startling  realistic 
lyric,  Grenf ell's  Alexandrian  Erotic  fragment,  in  which  the  trag- 
edy is,  that  between  a  man  and  a  woman  Cypris  has  taken  the  place 
of  philia:  'It  has  been  free  choice  in  both.  Friendship  came  before 
passion.  Anguish  seizes  me  when  I  remember. '  (It  is  explained  by 
Wilamowitz  in  the  Goettinger  Nachrichten  for  1896.) 

Had  the  conditions  of  the  paradosis  been  different,  all  that  might 
easily  have  happened.  And  how  different  then  would  have  been 
our  conception  of  the  supposed  limitations  of  Greek  literature.  Let 
us  remember  the  facts.  Let  us  be  sceptical  a  priori  towards  most 
statements  of  limitation  and  negation — all  generalizations  which 
state  that  'The  Greeks  had  no  conception  of  this,  no  understand- 
ing of  our  elevated  sentiments  with  regard  to  that. '  As  a  rule  the 
only  truth  in  such  statements  is  that  those  Greeks  who  had,  were 
not  canonical  in  Byzantine  schools.  And,  what  is  of  more  practical 
significance  to  ourselves,  let  us  remember  that  the  literature  which 
we  do  possess  has  been  filtered  through  the  same  limiting  and 
cramping  medium  which  rejected  the  rest,  and  that  the  traditional 
interpretation  of  our  texts,  especially  the  poetical  texts,  has  been 
mainly  the  work  of  those  generations  whose  activity  I  have  been 
describing,  and  suffers  still  from  the  need  of  a  freer  air  and  a  wider 
imagination. 


XIV 

THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION1 

By  Edward  Kennard  Rand 

The  ancient  classics,  the  literature  of  Greece  and  Rome,  were 
regarded  as  a  vital  constituent  of  education  from  the  moment  when 
they  were  produced.  Studied  with  devotion  as  the  immortal  memo- 
rials of  a  great  past,  they  have  led,  when  rightly  followed,  to  new 
and  high  achievement  in  the  present.  With  this  consideration  as  a 
clue,  let  us  travel  on  as  briskly  as  the  moments  at  our  disposal 
require  down  the  centuries  of  European  history. 

I  know  not  what  Homer  studied  when  he  went  to  school — for  may 
we  not,  encouraged  by  recent  discussions,  not  only  think  of  Homer 
in  personal  terms,  but  even  boldly  picture  him  as  a  schoolboy  once 
upon  a  time? — I  know  not  what  Homer  studied;  but  everybody 
knows  that  Homer  was  part  and  parcel  of  the  education  of  a  great 
age  that  came  after  him,  the  age  of  Periclean  Greece.  In  that  age, 
moreover,  we  see  that  twofold  impulse  of  the  human  spirit  which  the 
study  of  classical  literature  normally  inspires — reverence  for  the 
past,  and  the  passionate  desire  to  act  worthily  in  the  present. 
Aeschylus,  who  described  his  dramas  as  mere  slices  from  the 
Homeric  feast,  prepared  for  his  own  times,  as  Herder  remarked, 
another  kind  of  banquet.  The  Alexandrian  age,  which  created 
canonical  lists  of  the  best  authors,  among  whom  Aeschylus  now  took 
his  place,  was  also  an  age  of  startling  innovations  in  philosophy  and 
politics ;  in  literature,  much  pondering  of  Homer  led,  not  to  remote 
and  archaistic  fancies,  but  to  the  translation  of  heroic  types  into 

[i  Dr.  Edward  Kennard  Band,  Professor  of  Latin  in  Harvard  University, 
produced  this  article  as  a  contribution  to  the  volume  entitled  Latin  and  GreeTc 
in  American  Education,  with  Symposia  on  the  Value  of  Humanistic  Studies, 
edited  by  Francis  W.  Kelsey.  New  York,  1911.  The  article  is  now  reprinted 
with  the  consent  of  its  author  and  Professor  Kelsey.  It  is  the  first  of  three 
articles  in  Symposium  VI,  The  New  Education  (pp.  260  ff.),  the  other  two 
being  The  Classics  and  the  Elective  System,  by  R.  M.  Wenley,  and  The  Case 
for  the  Classics,  a  notable  study,  with  a  wealth  of  references  in  the  footnotes, 
by  Paul  Shorey. — Editor.] 


184  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

contemporary  terms.  Then  came  the  Romans,  not  an  alien  race  with 
a  hybrid  culture,  save  in  the  sense  that  all  culture  is  hybrid,  but 
creators  of  another  great  period  in  the  development  of  antiquity,  a 
period  less  novel  in  the  invention  of  literary  forms,  but  fertile  and 
to  the  highest  degree  original  in  the  adaptation  of  the  old.  Rome's 
innovations  in  human  history  are  conspicuous  enough;  they  fol- 
lowed naturally  from  a  loyal  consecration  to  the  past.  Beginning 
with  a  devotion  to  their  own  heroic  past,  they  connected  this  past 
deliberately  with  the  glories  of  Greek  literature  and  history,  when 
once  that  potent  influence  had  made  its  presence  felt.  Think  for  a 
moment  of  these  typical  Romans,  and  the  double  outlook  on  the  past 
and  on  the  present,  conspicuous  in  their  lives  and  works:  Ennius, 
who  refashioned  Latin  verse  in  the  new  Grecian  measure,  that  in 
this  verse  he  might  immortalize  the  history  of  his  country ;  Cicero, 
reverent  student  of  the  ancient  poetry  of  Ennius,  and  leader  of  his 
times  in  the  year  63 ;  Horace,  who  bids  the  learner 

Thumb  Greek  classics  night  and  day, 

and,  thanks  to  such  a  training,  arraigns  the  age  in  a  splendid  series 
of  Alcaean  odes.  Poets  who  know  their  own  day  only  are  the 
'singers  of  Euphorion,'  in  Cicero's  contemptuous  phrase.  Young 
Virgil,  perhaps  included  in  that  phrase,  has  so  little  fame  from  his 
early  poems,  which  bear  the  mark  of  Euphorion,  that  until  recently 
nobody  believed  he  could  have  written  them.  Virgil's  great  mes- 
sage to  his  generation,  and  to  ours,  came  in  a  poem  which  reveals 
an  intense  study  of  his  country's  past  and  an  intense  study  of 
Homer  and  Greek  tragedy. 

I  have  tarried  a  moment  with  the  ancients,  instead  of  beginning 
much  later  in  the  history  of  Europe,  expressly  to  suggest  that  the 
best  things  in  ancient  literature  were  not  written  solely  from  the 
artistic  but  often  from  the  social  motive  as  well.  Letters,  and, 
originally,  men  of  letters,  were  not  sundered  from  public  life,  but 
actively  contributed  to  it.  If  the  classics  have  moulded  later  history, 
it  is  not  merely  because  of  their  great  qualities  as  literature,  but 
because  they  are  involved  in  the  history  of  their  own  times,  and 
because  they  enshrine  the  ideals  of  a  liberal  and  four-square  edu- 
cation, such  as  their  authors  possessed.  This  is  a  matter  that  will 
become  obvious,  in  a  moment,  when  we  consider  the  educational 
program  of  Italian  humanism. 

But  first  we  must  quickly  traverse  the  intervening  ages — Middle 
Ages,  but  not  wholly  dark — which  a  new  system  of  education  con- 
trolled.   It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  Christian  Church  was 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        185 

hostile  to  pagan  culture;  on  the  contrary,  after  a  brief  season  of 
combat  and  readjustment,  the  old  learning  was  appropriated  for  a 
new  purpose.  But  the  purpose  was  new.  Whereas  to  Cicero  and 
Quintilian  the  goal  of  education  was  eloquentia,  the  art  of  expres- 
sion and  its  application  to  the  business  of  state,  the  Christian  monas- 
tery removed  from  the  world  and  prescribed  hours  of  silence.  Ill 
would  the  sophist  Polemo  have  fared  there,  who  was  buried  before 
the  breath  left  his  body,  that  he  might  not  be  seen  above  ground 
with  mouth  shut.  The  Christian  Church  maintained  both  systems 
of  education  for  some  time,  but  monasticism  gained  the  day,  and 
was  the  main  strength  of  education  till  later,  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
when  the  university  came.  Now  the  classics  did  not  perish  under 
the  new  regime ;  in  fact,  we  can  thank  the  monastery  for  preserving 
them  for  us.  They  constituted  the  first  step  in  education,  the 
'Human  Readings,'  as  Cassiodorus  called  them,  to  be  succeeded  by 
'Divine  Readings'  later.  More  than  that,  in  the  revival  of  learn- 
ing under  Charlemagne,  and  later  at  the  school  of  Chartres,  the 
ancient  idea  came  again  to  the  front.  John  of  Salisbury  in  the 
twelfth  century  had  a  great  deal  to  say  about  eloquentia,  while 
Hildebert  of  Tours  wrote  epigrams  delightfully  antique,  which 
could  deceive  the  very  elect ;  for  they  are  included  in  certain  modern 
editions  of  the  Anthologia  Latino,.  Church,  State,  and  learning 
were  more  intimately  associated  than  before.  The  university,  too, 
though  its  tendencies  were  philosophical  rather  than  humanistic, 
created  a  new  interest  in  Greek  by  finding  the  real  Aristotle  again, 
and  thus  led  the  way  for  the  humanists'  quest  of  all  Greek  litera- 
ture. Men  of  the  Middle  Ages  did  not  differ  radically  from  those 
of  succeeding  centuries  in  their  attitude  toward  the  classics. 
Humanism  and  philosophy  had  their  battles  in  that  period  as  in 
every  period,  but  the  importance  of  classical  culture  for  educa- 
tion was  in  general  unquestioned.  The  great  and  striking  differ- 
ence lay  in  the  amount  of  classical  culture  available.  The  division  of 
the  empire  into  an  East  and  a  West  effected  curious  results  in  civili- 
zation. Byzantium,  after  dark  ages  of  its  own,  settled  down  to  an 
eminently  respectable  scholarship  which  created  little  in  literature 
or  thought.  It  treasured  the  Greek  authors,  but  forgot  the  Roman. 
When  the  monk  Maximus  Planudes  at  the  end  of  the  thirteenth 
century  translated  various  Latin  authors  into  Greek,  he  selected 
those  most  in  vogue  in  the  West  at  that  time,  such  as  Ovid,  Boethius, 
Augustine,  Donatus,  Dionysius  Cato;  there  was  evidently  no  sepa- 
rate tradition  of  Latin  literature  at  Byzantium.  In  the  West, 
similarly,  the  stream  of  Greek  was  trickling  feebly;  the  knowledge 


186  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

of  the  language  had  not  completely  disappeared,  and  technical 
writers  like  Aristotle  and  the  author  of  the  Celestial  Hierarchy  were 
directly  introduced,  but  the  writers  typical  to  us  of  the  Hellenic 
genius  were  none  of  them  known.  Now  a  world  without  Homer,  the 
Attic  drama,  Thucydides,  Herodotus,  Demosthenes,  Theocritus,  a 
world  without  the  real  Plato,  is  bound  to  be  a  very  different  world 
from  our  own.  Not  that  this  loss  which  befell  the  Occident  was 
ultimately  a  calamity.  The  very  isolation  of  the  Roman  spirit 
permitted  its  most  triumphant  expression  in  Dante,  for  whose 
poetry  we  should  willingly  forego  whatever  a  combined  East  and 
West  might  have  achieved. 

To  see  how  the  mediaeval  imagination  was  still  fixed  faithfully 
upon  antiquity,  though  less  able  than  before  to  understand  its 
meaning,  we  turn  to  Dante,  who  mirrors  truly  the  vital  sentiments 
of  his  times.  Many  a  reader  has  felt  the  beauty  of  that  scene  in 
the  Purgatorio,  where  Dante  and  Beatrice  come  upon  a  troop  who 
sing: 

Benedictus  qui  venis, 

E  fior  gittando  di  sopra  e  dintorno, 

Manibus  o  date  lilia  plenis. 

Christian  liturgy  and  pagan  poetry,  which  to  some  could  sound 
only  a  discord,  blend  harmoniously  here.  But  for  a  more  striking 
instance  still  I  turn  to  Dante's  seventh  letter,  addressed  to  Henry 
VII  of  Germany  in  1311.  In  this  letter  Dante  speaks  of  'the  new 
hope  of  a  better  age'  which  'flashed  upon  Latium'  when  that 
monarch  came  down  into  Italy.  'Then  many  a  one,  anticipating 
in  his  joy  the  wishes  of  his  heart,  sang  with  Maro  of  the  kingdom  of 
Saturn  and  of  the  returning  Virgin.'  But  since  this  sun  of  their 
hopes  seems  to  tarry,  as  though  bidden  to  stand  by  a  second  Joshua, 
Italy  is  tempted  to  cry:  'Art  thou  he  that  should  come,  or  do  we 
look  for  another?'  Dante  himself  has  firm  faith  in  the  'minister 
of  God '  and  '  the  promoter  of  Roman  glory, '  but  wonders  still  why 
he  can  delay,  apparently  believing  that  the  boundaries  of  Rome 
end  at  Liguria.  But  the  real  Rome  'scarce  deigneth  to  be  bounded 
by  the  barren  wave  of  ocean ;  for  it  is  written  for  us : 

Nascetur  pulchra  Troianus  origine  Caesar 
Imperium  Oceano,  famam  qui  terminet  astris.' 

Had  not  the  edict  'that  all  the  world  should  be  taxed'  issued  from 
the  'council  chamber  of  the  most  righteous  princedom,'  the  Son  of 
God  would  not  have  '  chosen  that  time  to  be  born  of  a  Virgin. '    So 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        187 

let  the  emperor  not  delay,  but  'let  that  word  of  Curio  to  Caesar 
ring  forth  once  more : 

Dum  trepidant  nullo  firmatae  robore  partes, 
Tolle  moras ;  semper  nocuit  differre  paratis ; 
Par  labor  atque  metus  pretio  maiore  petuntur. 

Let  that  voice  of  the  chider  ring  forth  from  the  clouds  once  more 
against  Aeneas: 

Si  te  nulla  movet  tantarum  gloria  rerum,  .  .  . 
Ascanium  surgentem  et  spes  heredis  Iuli 
Respice;  .  .  . 

for  John,  thy  royal  first-born  ...  is  for  us  a  second  Ascanius  who, 
following  in  the  footprints  of  his  great  sire,  shall  rage  like  a  lion 
all  around  against  every  Turnus,  and  shall  be  gentle  as  a  lamb 
toward  the  Latins.'  Dante  then  warns  the  emperor  by  the  exam- 
ple of  David,  whom  Samuel  rebuked  for  sparing  'the  sinners  of 
Amalek.'  He  warns  him  by  the  example  of  Hercules,  for  there 
are  many  heads  of  the  Italian  hydra,  and  if  Cremona  is  lopped 
off  Brescia  and  Paria  will  remain.  He  must  strike  at  the  viper 
itself,  even  Florence,  who  is  that  'foul  and  impious  Myrrha  that 
burns  for  the  embraces  of  her  father  Cinyras,'  'that  passionate 
Amata  who  rejected  the  wedlock  decreed  by  fate,'  thus  resisting 
'the  ordinance  of  God'  and  worshiping  'the  idol  of  her  proper 
will.'  So  come, 'thou  lofty  scion  of  Jesse.  Take  to  thee  confidence 
from  the  eyes  of  the  Lord  God  of  Sabaoth  .  .  .  and  lay  this  Golias 
low  with  the  sling  of  thy  wisdom  and  the  stone  of  thy  strength. ' 

Surely  for  this  act  of  public  service — the  greatest,  Dante  doubt- 
less thought,  that  he  could  render  his  country — the  authority  of 
Virgil  and  Lucan  and  Ovid  seems  well-nigh  as  efficient  as  that  of 
Scripture  itself.  May  we  not  say  that  for  Dante,  as  truly  as  for 
any  later  humanist,  the  study  of  the  ancients  had  an  immediate 
bearing  upon  the  problems  of  the  day  ? 

When  Dante  had  finished  his  work  it  was  time  for  a  new  epoch. 
Scholasticism  had  run  its  course.  After  so  minute  and  comprehen- 
sive a  vision  of  the  kingdom  of  this  world  and  the  next  as  St. 
Thomas  records,  some  sort  of  protest  and  readjustment  is  inevitable 
if  the  human  sense  of  wonder  is  to  persist;  in  a  universe  where 
nothing  escapes  the  observer,  the  observer,  as  Lucretius  knew,  will 
find  at  last : 

eadem  sunt  omnia  semper. 


188  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

So  scholasticism  declined  and  a  new  age  came,  in  which,  education 
returned  to  the  methods  of  antiquity.  We  need  not  pause  to  exam- 
ine the  causes  of  this  event ;  but  its  most  significant  concomitant  is 
the  return  of  Greek  literature  to  the  Western  World.  There  is  a 
humorous  aspect  to  the  triumphs  of  the  humanists,  who  'dis- 
covered' Latin  authors  long  treasured  on  monastic  shelves.  Quin- 
tilian,  welcomed  back  with  such  a  furor,  had  been  the  patron  saint 
of  the  school  of  Chartres.  The  humanists  could  rediscover  because 
in  the  thirteenth  century  the  classical  interests  of  the  twelfth  had 
yielded  to  philosophy,  and  in  the  fourteenth,  monastic  discipline 
and  the  monastic  library  had  lapsed  into  decay.  But  I  would  not 
belittle  the  importance  of  what  to  the  contemporaries  of  Poggio 
were  certainly  discoveries.  For  the  thirst  for  discoveries  led  also  to 
the  more  careful  study  of  the  authors  existing.  Petrarch  initiated 
the  movement;  though  curiously  mediaeval  in  some  respects,  he 
deserves  his  title  of  the  first  modern  man,  and  this  because  of  his 
passion  for  antiquity.  His  great  service  is  not  so  much  the  dis- 
covery of  Cicero's  letters  as  the  exaltation  of  Ciceronian  ideas, 
which  were  from  that  time  on  the  guiding  principle  of  humanistic 
education.  Petrarch's  craving  for  Homer,  too,  ill  satisfied  by  the 
wretched  translation  which  his  teacher  made,  gave  impetus  to  the 
general  demand  for  the  Greek  authors.  Work  after  work  was  won 
back ;  practically  all  the  authors  that  we  have  to-day  were  recovered 
before  the  fall  of  Constantinople  in  1453,  which  date  surely  does 
not  mark  the  beginning  of  the  Renaissance.  What  wonder  if  the 
age,  intoxicated  by  the  new  draught,  indulged  itself  in  various 
excesses?  What  wonder,  too,  if  at  first  the  habits  of  centuries  pre- 
vented men  from  rightly  valuing  their  new  treasures,  so  that 
throughout  the  Renaissance  the  doctrine  prevailed  that  the  greater 
literature  was  the  Latin?  The  Greek  authors  had  at  any  rate 
returned,  and  civilization  could  not  remain  as  before. 

For  a  glimpse  into  the  new  school  of  the  humanists  after  Greek 
had  its  sure  place  there,  we  can  do  no  better  than  open  a  little  book 
by  Battista  Guarino,  De  Ordine  Docendi  et  Studendi,  published  in 
1459.  Battista  Guarino  is  less  celebrated  than  his  father,  and  dis- 
tinctly less  celebrated  than  Vittorino  da  Feltre,  the  greatest  teacher 
of  the  Renaissance.  The  curriculum  at  this  school  is  narrower  than 
that  of  Vergerio  or  Aeneas  Silvius;  for  this  reason  it  is  a  safer 
guide  to  the  average  practice  of  the  day.  Guarino  restricts  the 
disciplines  to  ancient  literature  and  history,  Greek  and  Latin; 
logic  and  ethics,  for  instance,  are  introduced,  not  as  independent 
studies,  but  because  they  are  necessary  for  the   explanation  of 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        189 

Cicero.  The  program  sounds  rather  barren,  but  we  must  study  it 
more  deeply  to  see  what  it  means.  Literature  involves  grammar, 
of  course,  and  prosody,  and  likewise  composition  in  both  prose  and 
verse.  The  works  of  Virgil  should  be  learned  by  heart,  for  '  in  this 
way  the  flow  of  the  hexameter,  not  less  than  the  quantity  of  indi- 
vidual syllables,  is  impressed  on  the  ear,  and  insensibly  moulds  the 
taste. '  Nor  should  the  contents  of  poetry  be  neglected.  Its  fictions 
have  moral  as  well  as  artistic  value.  They  exhibit  the  realities  of 
our  own  life  under  the  form  of  imaginary  persons  and  situations; 
Cicero's  authority  is  quoted  for  this  sentiment,  and  St.  Jerome  is 
cited  to  good  purpose.  The  lessons  of  history,  too,  are  of  great 
value.  By  it,  Guarino  states,  the  student  will  learn  'to  understand 
the  manners,  laws,  and  institutions  of  different  types  of  nations, 
and  will  examine  the  varying  fortunes  of  individuals  and  states, 
the  sources  of  their  success  and  failure,  their  strength  and  their 
weakness.  Not  only  is  such  knowledge  of  interest  in  daily  inter- 
course, but  it  is  of  practical  value  in  the  ordering  of  affairs. '  Now 
though  logic  and  ethics  may  have  been  an  aside,  they  involved  the 
direct  study  of  Aristotle  and  Plato.  "We  find  other  asides,  too — 
astronomy,  and  geography,  and  Roman  Law,  and  the  writers  on 
those  subjects.  Moreover,  independent  reading  is  a  vital  part  of 
the  plan,  and  among  authors  suggested  as  appropriate  for  such 
reading  are  St.  Augustine,  Aulus  Gellius,  Macrobius,  the  elder 
Pliny,  '  whose  Natural  History  is  indeed  as  wide  as  nature  herself. ' 
The  pupil  is  bidden  to  practise  his  memory  by  going  over  at  the 
end  of  each  day  what  he  has  just  learned;  he  is  told  to  do  much 
reading  aloud,  since  this  will  give  him  the  confidence  which  the 
public  speaker  needs.  Throughout  these  instructions  there  is  con- 
stant reference  to  the  moral  goal  of  education.  '  In  purity  of  grace 
and  style,'  Guarino  affirms,  'in  worthy  deeds  worthily  presented,  in 
noble  thoughts  nobly  said,  in  all  these,  and  not  in  one  alone,  the 
learner  finds  the  nourishment  of  his  mind  and  spirit. '  But  literature 
is  not  merely  moral;  it  trains  the  dramatic  imagination.  'In  this 
way, '  he  continues,  '  we  are  not  disturbed  by  the  impieties,  cruelties, 
horrors,  which  we  find  there ;  we  judge  these  things  simply  by  their 
congruity  to  the  characters  and  situations  described.  We  criticize 
the  artist,  not  the  moralist.'  The  ultimate  secret  of  this  method 
is  its  foundation  in  personality,  and  humanity.  'Finally,'  he  de- 
clares, 'through  books  and  books  alone,  will  your  converse  be  with 
the  best  and  greatest,  nay  even  with  the  mighty  dead  them- 
selves. ...  To  man  only  is  given  the  desire  to  learn.    Hence  what 


190  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

the  Greeks  called  muSeia  we  call  studia  humanitatis;  for  learning 
and  virtue  are  peculiar  to  man;  therefore  our  forefathers  called 
them  "humanitas,"  the  pursuits,  the  activities,  proper  to  mankind. 
And  no  branch  of  knowledge  embraces  so  wide  a  range  of  subjects 
as  that  learning  which  I  have  now  attempted  to  describe. ' 

Nothing  but  Greek  and  Latin.  Under  Guarino's  cultivation, 
these  ancient  roots  branch  out  as  widely  as  the  flower  in  the  cran- 
nied wall.  These  studies  of  antiquity  educate  the  whole  man — 
moral,  aesthetic,  intellectual ;  they  train  him  to  independent  think- 
ing, for  the  authors  are  but  the  starting-point ;  they  inculcate  rever- 
ence for  the  past;  they  teach  its  application  to  the  present.  Now 
two  historical  facts  are  plain  with  reference  to  this  program.  First, 
it  is  simply  the  ancient  method  of  Cicero  and  Quintilian  all  over 
again.  Both  authors  are  constantly  cited  for  principles  as  well  as 
facts;  'virtuiis  laus  omnis  in  actione  consistit,'  said  Cicero,  and 
Vittorino  echoes  the  words.  Second,  it  is  the  basis  of  every  truly 
humanistic  program  established  from  that  day  to  this.  Its  prin- 
ciples appear  in  some  dozen  treatises  of  the  day,  and  from  Italy 
spread  to  the  North.  "What  I  have  quoted  does  not  touch  all  the 
elements  in  humanistic  education.  Science  and  mathematics  re- 
ceived more  consideration  than  one  might  suppose.  Religious  train- 
ing was  not  neglected,  as  it  is  with  us ;  polite  demeanor,  dress,  physi- 
cal exercise,  all  were  matters  for  attention.  And  let  me  emphasize 
again  the  point  I  would  specially  make:  the  twofold  character  of 
their  education,  its  reverence  for  the  past  and  its  interest  in  the 
present,  derives  clearly  from  the  ancient  prototype. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  quote  in  extenso  the  leading  humanists  of 
the  North  for  proof  that  the  new  educational  ideals  are  eagerly 
appropriated  and  applied.  Rudolphus  Agricola  in  Germany,  Vives 
in  Holland,  but  originally  from  Spain,  Dorat  and  the  learned  Bude 
in  France,  diverge  in  no  essential  particular  from  Vittorino.  Let 
Erasmus,  the  most  cosmopolitan  man  of  his  day,  speak  for  them  all. 
'The  first  object  of  education,'  he  declares,  'is  to  teach  the  young 
mind  to  foster  the  seeds  of  piety,  the  next  to  love  and  learn  the 
liberal  arts,  the  third  to  prepare  itself  for  the  duties  of  life,  the 
fourth,  from  its  earliest  years  to  cultivate  civil  manners. '  Erasmus 
truly  represents  England,  as  well  as  his  own  land,  but  a  native  voice 
was  also  heard  from  our  mother-country  at  that  time.  I  mean,  not 
Roger  Ascham,  who  comes  later  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and  whose 
system  is  a  bit  ladylike  in  its  painful  propriety,  but  Thomas  Elyot, 
who,  in  his  Book  of  the  Governour  (1531),  interpreted  Erasmus 
and  Bude  to  England.    The  idea  that  the  study  of  the  classics  was 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        191 

merely  the  study  of  two  foreign  and  ancient  tongues  would  find  no 
favor  with  him.  'Only  to  possess  language,'  he  declared,  4s  to  be  a 
popinjay. '  Homer  holds  for  him  far  more  than  that.  '  If  by  read- 
ing the  sage  counsel  of  Nestor,  the  subtle  persuasions  of  Ulysses,  the 
compendious  gravity  of  Menelaus,  the  imperial  majesty  of  Aga- 
memnon, the  prowess  of  Achilles,  the  valiant  courage  of  Hector, 
we  may  apprehend  anything  whereby  our  wits  may  be  amended 
and  our  personages  more  apt  to  serve  our  public  weal  and  our 
prince,  what  forceth  it  us  though  Homer  writes  leasings?'  As 
with  Guarino,  the  poetic  lie  has  its  moral  function.  Elyot  con- 
cludes :  '  I  think  verily  if  children  were  brought  up  as  I  have  writ- 
ten, and  continually  were  retained  in  the  right  study  of  every 
philosophy  until  they  passed  the  age  of  twenty-one  years  and  then 
set  to  the  laws  of  this  realm  .  .  .  undoubtedly  they  should  become 
men  of  so  excellent  wisdom  that,  throughout  the  world,  men  should 
be  found  in  no  commonweal  more  noble  counselors.' 

These  words  have  the  ring  of  a  familiar  passage  in  Bacon's 
Advancement  of  Learning,  concerning  the  learned  governor.  '  Nay, 
let  a  man  look  into  the  government  of  the  Bishops  of  Rome,'  he 
remarks,  'as  by  name,  into  the  government  of  Pius  Quintus,  and 
Sextus  Quintus,  in  our  times,  who  were  both  at  their  entrance 
esteemed  but  as  pedantical  friars,  and  he  shall  find  that  such  Popes 
do  greater  things,  and  proceed  upon  truer  principles  of  estate, 
than  those  which  have  ascended  to  the  papacy  from  an  education 
and  breeding  in  affairs  of  estate  and  courts  of  princes.'  Or,  to 
translate  this  into  modern  terms,  let  future  lawyers  take  Classics 
in  college,  and  not  confine  themselves  to  Economics. 

Need  I  say  that  all  Bacon's  thinking  was  seasoned  through  and 
through  with  the  classics?  He  was  no  pedantic  advocate,  surely 
no  advocate  of  the  Ciceronianist,  whom  he  berates  as  soundly  as 
he  does  the  scholastic.  'Then  did  Car  of  Cambridge  and  Ascham, 
with  their  lectures  and  writings,  almost  deify  Cicero  and  Demos- 
thenes, and  allure  young  men  that  were  studious,  into  that  delicate 
and  polished  kind  of  learning.  Then  did  Erasmus  take  the  occasion 
to  make  the  scoffing  echo:  "Decern  annos  consumpsi  in  legendo 
Cicerone" ';  and  the  echo  answered  in  Greek  "*Ove,"  (—  "Asine").' 

Bacon  brings  us  naturally  to  Milton,  a  Puritan  and  a  rebel,  who 
also,  thanks  to  the  ancients,  could  temper  his  virtue  with  Epicu- 
reanism, and  show  in  his  poetry  that  liturgic  reverence  for  the  past 
which  is  ingrained  in  classic  literature.  Milton  writes  a  brief  trea- 
tise Of  Education  to  his  friend  Samuel  Hartlib,  and  in  it  he  says : 
'I  call,  therefore,  a  complete  and  generous  education,  that  which 


192  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

fits  a  man  to  perform  justly,  skilfully,  and  magnanimously  all  the 
offices,  both  private  and  public,  of  peace  and  war.  And  how  all 
this  may  be  done  between  twelve  and  one-and-twenty,  less  time  than 
is  now  bestowed  in  pure  trifling  at  grammar  and  sophistry,  is  to 
be  thus  ordered. '  Then,  outlining  his  main  topics,  as  studies,  exer- 
cise, and  diet,  he  treats  of  the  first :  '  First,  they  should  begin  with 
the  chief  and  necessary  rules  of  some  good  grammar  .  .  .  and  .  .  . 
their  speech  is  to  be  fashioned  to  a  distinct  and  clear  pronunciation, 
as  near  as  may  be  to  the  Italian,  especially  in  the  vowels.'  He  is 
speaking,  of  course,  of  Latin  grammar.  He  proceeds  with  a  lengthy 
list  of  readings  in  Greek  and  Latin  literature,  which  soon  runs  into 
mathematics  and  many  natural  sciences,  politics,  philosophy,  and 
religion.  '  And  either  now  or  before  this, '  he  interposes,  '  they  may 
have  easily  learned  at  any  odd  hour  the  Italian  tongue.'  As  with 
Guarino,  education  was  not  all  done  by  courses. 

Thus  far  our  examination  of  the  history  of  classical  education  in 
Europe  has  been  pleasant  enough,  at  least  for  those  who  are  favor- 
ably disposed  toward  the  classics.  "We  have  seen  the  ancient  ideal 
reintroduced  in  the  Italian  Renaissance,  disseminated  in  the  north- 
ern countries,  and  established  once  for  all,  we  should  imagine,  by 
mighty  thinkers  like  Bacon  and  Milton.  But  no  human  institution 
is  permanent,  and,  even  in  the  times  with  which  we  have  been 
dealing,  forces  were  at  work  which  tended  to  discredit  an  educa- 
tional program  based  on  the  classics. 

One  such  force  was  the  decay  of  the  method  itself.  All  move- 
ments tend  eventually  to  a  period  of  formalism  and  petrifaction. 
Petrifaction  seized  the  classical  program  when  the  limits  of  good 
Latin  style  were  restricted  to  Cicero,  and  taste  in  general  became 
puristic.  Politian  had  read  sympathetically  in  the  authors  of  silver 
latinity,  and  appropriated  their  phrases  at  will,  because,  he  said, 
he  was  expressing,  not  them,  or  Cicero,  or  anybody  but  himself. 
Bembo  shrank  from  calling  Deity  anything  but  dii  immortales,  and 
warned  a  young  friend  against  too  much  reading  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, lest  it  spoil  his  Latin  style.  That  was  the  age,  too,  when 
handbooks  of  imaginative  etiquette  were  compiled  to  save  the  poets 
from  mistakes.  Lists  were  furnished  of  proper  epithets  for  fre- 
quent nouns;  thus  aer  could  be  liquidus  and  igneus  and  a  few 
other  things,  but  under  no  circumstances  anything  else.  Clearly  a 
system  which  engendered  such  absurdities  was  not  destined  to  long 
life.  Two  events  came  to  the  rescue  of  humanism.  One  was  its 
transfer  to  the  other  countries,  where  its  vital  elements  were  bound 
to  take  hold,  and  where  the  absence  of  patriotic  interest  left  the 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        193 

judgment  more  free  and  critical;  though.  France  was  somewhat 
bitten  with  Ciceronianism,  though  the  delicate  Ascham  approved  it, 
the  sturdy  sense  of  the  greatest  men  of  the  period,  like  Erasmus  and 
Bacon,  dealt  it  crushing  blows. 

The  other  event  was  the  Protestant  Reformation.  The  relation 
of  the  Reformation  to  humanism  is  somewhat  complex.  In  its 
wilder  and  iconoclastic  manifestations  it  was  the  foe  of  all  culture, 
but  the  national  element  in  protest  against  Rome  should  not  be 
forgotten.  Nationality  is  allied  to  secularism,  and  both  are  allied 
to  humanism.  Further,  the  method  of  the  schoolmen  had  a  stronger 
hold  in  the  North,  especially  in  France,  the  land  of  its  birth,  than 
it  had  in  Italy.  There  the  normal  antagonist  of  humanism  was  the 
Sorbonne,  and  the  Sorbonne  stood  for  Catholic  theology  and  the 
Roman  Church.  Thus  George  Buchanan,  in  temperament  much 
like  Erasmus,  at  any  rate  untouched  by  the  evangelical  fervor  of 
Protestantism,  found  it  natural,  not,  like  Erasmus,  to  remain  in  the 
Roman  fold,  but  with  many  of  his  French  associates  to  go  over  to 
Protestantism.  In  Italy  this  via  media  did  not  exist.  It  was 
humanism  and  the  Church,  or,  for  the  humanist  who  did  not  care 
for  the  Church,  it  was  humanism  and  neo-paganism.  Now,  while 
we  must  appreciate  the  great  service  performed  by  the  Reforma- 
tion for  the  humanistic  ideal,  and  admire  characters  like  Melanch- 
thon  and  Zwingli,  and  not  form  hasty  generalizations  on  the  bar- 
renness of  Puritanism  when  it  includes  a  Milton,  we  must  also 
recognize  the  other  half  of  the  truth  which  I  have  just  suggested, 
namely,  that  the  exaggerations  of  the  spirit  of  the  Reformation 
were  a  blow  to  culture,  and  that  they  must  be  reckoned  as  a  second 
force  operative  against  the  classics. 

From  France  there  proceeded  another  disturbing  influence 
toward  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the  famous  querelle 
des  anciens  et  des  modernes.  The  moderns,  whose  sentiments  first 
found  effective  expression  in  Charles  Perrault  and  his  poem  on 
Le  Siecle  de  Louis  le  Grand  (published  1687),  represented  a  whole- 
some national  and  Christian  feeling,  but  committed  absurdities 
both  in  the  defense  of  their  own  position  and  in  their  attacks  on 
the  ancients.  The  chronological  argument  loomed  large.  With 
centuries  of  high  achievement  behind  them,  why  should  not  the 
present,  profiting  by  experience,  do  still  greater  things?  This 
reasoning  seemed  convincing,  so  long  as  the  modern  illustrations 
of  superiority  were  not  mentioned ;  when  Chapelain  and  Desmarets 
were  adduced  as  such,  the  proof  fell  rather  flat;  for  the  literary 
works  of  the  moderns,  so  far  from  representing  anything  of  the 


194  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

spirit  of  romantic  revolt,  were  pseudo-classic  in  character,  and  their 
literary  criticism  was  distinctly  pseudo-classic.  Virgil  came  off 
fairly  well  at  their  hands ;  it  was  because  he  stood  several  centuries 
nearer  modernity  than  Homer  did,  and  because  he  was  compara- 
tively free  from  glaring  inelegancies.  On  Homer  fell  the  brunt  of 
their  attack;  the  vulgar  characters  admitted  into  his  poems,  and 
the  indecorous  behavior  of  his  nobilities,  made  him  an  obvious  target 
for  the  well-mannered  critic  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The  reply 
of  the  beleaguered  classicists  is  not  particularly  significant.  Most 
of  them  were  ready  to  acknowledge  the  superiority  of  Virgil  over 
Homer;  in  fact,  it  had  been  accepted  ever  since  Vida  and  the 
Renaissance,  and  most  vituperatively  proclaimed  by  the  elder 
Scaliger.  Fenelon,  it  is  true,  refused  to  decide  between  the  poets, 
and  Madame  Dacier  even  gave  the  palm  to  Homer.  But  her  dec- 
laration that  nature  had  exhausted  its  resources  in  Homer,  and  had 
not  the  power  to  produce  another  like  him,  is  of  the  excessive, 
pseudo-classic  sort  of  criticism  that  makes  appreciation  stagnant. 

At  all  events,  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  was  not  an 
auspicious  epoch  for  the  classics,  especially  for  Greek.  Indeed,  it 
would  seem  that  nobody  had  really  entered  into  the  spirit  of  Greek 
literature,  save  possibly  the  members  of  the  Pleiade  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  since  its  recovery  in  the  Renaissance.  The  interrelation 
of  Greek  and  Latin,  the  dependency  of  Latin  literature,  was  recog- 
nized; 'Latin  is  a  rivulet,  Greek  a  mighty  river,'  said  Erasmus,  in 
the  words  of  Cicero.  Ascham  laughs  at  the  good  bishop  who 
thought  the  need  of  the  Greek  tongue  was  fulfilled  now  that  every- 
thing had  been  translated  into  Latin,  and  compares  the  Latin 
scholar  without  Greek  to  a  bird  of  one  wing.  At  the  same  time  a 
remark  of  his  own  betrays  an  intelligence  hardly  finer  than  the 
Bishop's:  'And  surely,'  he  says,  'if  Varro's  books  had  remained 
to  posterity,  as  by  God's  providence  the  most  part  of  Tully  did, 
then  truly  the  Latin  tongue  might  have  made  good  comparison 
with  the  Greek.' 

Are  we  distressed,  sometimes,  that  we  live  no  more  in  the  ages 
of  accepted  humanism,  and  that  Greek  is  going  to  the  wall?  We 
have  only  to  remember  that  it  has  seen  gloomy  days,  days  of  mis- 
appreciation,  before.  Even  in  the  sixteenth  century  Casaubon 
could  write : '  I  am  deep  in  Athenaeus,  and  I  hope  my  labor  will  not 
be  in  vain.  But  one's  industry  is  sadly  damped  by  the  reflection 
how  Greek  is  now  neglected  and  despised.  Looking  to  posterity  or 
the  next  generation,  what  motive  has  one  for  devotion  to  study?' 

We  should  take  heart  of  grace,  likewise,  in  recalling  that  educa- 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        195 

tional  follies  are  not  exclusively  the  product  of  the  nineteenth  and 
twentieth  centuries:  Montaigne's  father  brought  him  up  by  the 
latest  pedagogy.  'As  to  Greek,'  he  remarks,  'of  which  I  have  but 
a  mere  smattering,  my  father  also  designed  to  have  it  taught  me 
by  a  trick ;  but  a  new  one,  and  by  way  of  sport ;  tossing  our  declen- 
sions to  and  fro,  after  the  manner  of  those  who,  by  certain  games  at 
tables  and  chess,  learn  geometry  and  arithmetic;  for  he,  amongst 
other  rules,  had  been  advised  to  make  me  relish  science  and  duty 
by  an  unforced  will  and  of  my  own  voluntary  motion.'  We  see 
that  the  method  of  'not  teaching  but  informally  introducing'  is 
not  the  last  word  of  the  latest  philosophy.  In  such  fear  was  this 
good  father  that  he  might  disturb  the  brain  of  his  child  that  in  the 
morning  he  did  not  rudely  wake  him  by  a  shake,  but  had  gentle 
music  played  to  him  that  the  waking  might  be  gradual.  This  edu- 
cational scheme  did  not  last  very  long ;  the  boy  was  so  heavy,  idle, 
and  indisposed  that,  he  declares,  'they  could  not  rouse  me  from 
my  sloth,  not  even  to  get  me  out  to  play.'  He  therefore  was  sent 
to  school,  where  the  discipline  was  so  strict  that  he  enjoyed  reading 
Ovid  on  the  sly;  even  so  the  poet  Lowell  cut  conic  sections  for  a 
private  hour  with  Aeschylus. 

To  pass  on  now  to  th-»  eighteenth  century,  we  may  note  pseudo- 
classic  influences  in  all  the  countries  as  a  preservative  of  the  human- 
istic scheme — they  preserved  by  embalming  it,  but  contributed  noth- 
ing to  its  growth.  In  France,  especially,  Roman  Catholic  education 
was  closely  identified  with  the  Jesuits ;  from  the  end  of  the  sixteenth 
century  they  had  shown,  by  basing  their  own  instruction  upon  the 
classics,  particularly  the  Latin  classics,  that  humanism  was  not 
the  exclusive  property  of  the  Reformers.  The  famous  Delphin  edi- 
tions, published  toward  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  for  a 
very  indifferent  young  Dauphin,  proved  acceptable  in  many  other 
schools  besides  those  of  the  Jesuits.  The  order  maintained  its 
prominence  in  education  in  the  eighteenth  century,  and  has  not 
ceased  its  activities  to-day.  "Whatever  else  may  be  said  of  this 
illustrious  company,  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  its  tremendous 
missionary  undertakings  have  been  the  product,  or  the  concomitant, 
of  an  educational  system  that  is  classical,  if  not  pseudo-classical,  in 
character.  England  was  not  influenced  vitally  by  the  Jesuits  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  but  in  its  own  way  maintained  the  supremacy 
of  the  classics.  'All  the  faculties  of  the  mind,'  remarked  Oibbon, 
'may  be  exercised  by  the  study  of  ancient  literature.'  A  classical 
training  was  firmly  believed  to  be  an  admirable  preparation  for 
political  life.     Statesmen  like  Chatham  and  Fox  and  Pitt  and 


196  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

Burke  did  not  fail  to  recognize  its  bearing  upon  modern  problems, 
or  to  point  an  argument  with  a  classical  quotation.  They  were 
simply  continuing  the  tradition  that  we  have  seen  before  in  Bacon, 
and  before  him  in  Vittorino,  and  before  him  in  Dante. 

To  England,  too,  is  due  a  fresh  appreciation  of  ancient  literature 
for  the  reason  that  the  meaning  of  Homer  was  at  last  beginning  to 
grow  clear.  Pope,  whatever  his  offenses,  deserves,  with  Bentley, 
whom  he  abused,  no  small  share  of  the  credit,  and  Blackwell  and 
Wood  made  further  advance.  This  is  a  quiet  little  movement,  the 
approach  to  romanticism  in  eighteenth-century  England,  and  a 
gain  for  classical  education.  But  the  doctrines  of  Rousseau  and 
the  impetus  of  the  French  Revolution  broke  in  a  romantic  storm 
which  in  principle  carried  with  it  little  reverence  for  antiquity. 
At  the  same  time  it  benefited  the  classics  by  clearing  away  false 
notions  of  their  immaculateness,  and  by  revealing  Greek  afresh. 
For  the  latter  event  we  must  be  grateful,  not  only  to  England,  but 
to  the  German  school  of  criticism,  inaugurated  before  the  days  of 
Romanticism  by  Winckelmann,  and  completed  by  Lessing,  Herder, 
Schiller,  and  Goethe.  True,  in  this  Teutonic  Hellenism  there  are 
exaggerations,  strange  lights  that  never  shone  on  sea  or  land,  and 
it  led  to  a  dearth  in  the  appreciation  of  Latin  literature  in  Germany, 
down  till  only  a  few  years  ago.  England  took  the  movement  more 
soberly.  Wordsworth,  the  high  priest  of  nature,  could  look  back 
to  Horace  and  sigh  for 

The  humblest  note  of  those  sad  strains. 

No  change  in  the  humanistic  ideal  was  made  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  wherever  that  ideal  was  truly  interpreted.  Arnold  of 
Rugby,  who  typifies  English  education  at  its  best,  founded  his 
system  on  the  classics.  '  The  study  of  language, '  he  said,  '  seems  to 
me  as  if  given  for  the  very  purpose  of  forming  the  human  mind  in 
youth ;  and  the  Greek  and  Latin  languages  .  .  .  seem  the  very 
instruments  by  which  this  is  to  be  effected. '  Arnold  was  also  deeply 
impressed  with  the  moral  inspiration  that  comes  from  association 
with  the  past — not  only  with  the  literature  of  the  past,  but  with 
the  very  buildings  in  which  education  has  made  its  home.  'There 
is,  or  there  ought  to  be,'  he  declares,  'something  very  ennobling  in 
being  connected  with  an  establishment  at  once  ancient  and  magnifi- 
cent, where  ...  all  the  associations  belonging  to  the  objects  around 
us  should  be  great,  splendid,  and  elevating.  What  an  individual 
ought  and  often  does  derive  from  the  feeling  that  he  is  born  of  an 
old  and  illustrious  race,  from  being  familiar  from  his  childhood 


THE  CLASSICS  IN  EUROPEAN  EDUCATION        197 

with  the  walls  and  trees  which  speak  of  the  past  no  less  than  the 
present,  and  make  both  full  of  images  of  greatness,  this,  in  an 
inferior  degree,  belongs  to  every  member  of  an  ancient  and  cele- 
brated place  of  education.'  Finally,  Arnold  directed  the  enthusi- 
asm thus  gained  from  the  past  upon  the  immediate  present.  He 
writes  to  a  friend :  '  I  cannot  deny  that  you  have  an  anxious  duty — 
a  duty  which  some  might  suppose  was  too  heavy  for  your  years. 
But  it  seems  to  me  the  nobler  as  well  as  the  truer  way  of  stating  the 
case  to  say  that  it  is  the  great  privilege  of  this  and  other  institu- 
tions to  anticipate  the  common  time  of  manhood;  that  by  their 
whole  training  they  fit  the  character  for  manly  duties  at  an  age 
when,  under  another  system,  such  duties  would  be  impracticable.' 
The  classics,  he  thought,  then,  so  far  from  abstracting  the  learner 
from  the  present,  prepare  him  more  speedily  than  any  other  system 
does  for  its  service. 

As  we  go  farther  in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  especially  as 
we  come  to  our  own  times,  we  are  forced  to  acknowledge  that  to 
many  thinkers  the  classics  are  no  longer  an  indispensable  part  of 
education.  The  causes  of  this  attitude  are  not  far  to  seek — roman- 
ticism, naturalism,  and  the  breaking-down  of  authority  of  all  kinds. 
Germany  has  contributed  largely.  Germany  rediscovered  Greek 
literature,  and  exterminated  Latin.  Germany  has  led  the  way  to 
the  scientific  study  of  the  classics,  and  garnered  more  results  than 
any  other  nation.  It  contributed  the  philosophy  of  relativity  which, 
joining  forces  with  the  doctrine  of  evolution,  the  product  of  Eng- 
lish science,  led  to  new  methods  and  manifold  results  in  the  study 
of  history.  But  an  excessive  scrutiny  of  origins  has  impaired  the 
efficacy  of  the  classics.  The  tendency  of  the  historical  spirit  is  to 
compel  illustrious  characters  of  the  past  to  know  their  place,  where- 
as the  Middle  Ages  and  the  Renaissance  summoned  the  ancients  to 
transgress  their  periods — yes,  to  walk  down  the  centuries  and  shake 
hands.  A  late  mediaeval  tapestry  at  Langeais  sets  forth  a  goodly 
troop  of  knights,  all  caparisoned  cap-a-pie  in  the  same  manner; 
they  are  Godfrey  of  Bouillon,  Julius  Caesar,  Samson,  and  some 
others.  We  shudder  when  we  find  the  Byzantine  chronicler  Malalas 
putting  Polybius  before  Herodotus,  or  John  the  Scot  setting  Mar- 
tianus  Capella  in  the  times  of  Cicero,  but  are  ourselves  inclined 
to  forget  that,  though  history  has  its  periods,  the  imagination  has 
none.  We  should  encourage  it  to  glorious  anachronisms,  or  rather 
hyperchronisms,  for  if  it  is  chronologically  fettered  the  classics 
become  demodernized.  A  further  tendency  of  historical  analysis 
is  to  resolve  great  personalities  and  traditions  into  causes  and 


198  EDWARD  KENNARD  RAND 

effects.  An  author  is  not  regarded  as  an  entity  unless  he  is  influ- 
encing somebody  else ;  when  the  critics  look  at  him,  he  disappears 
in  a  mist  of  sources.  Let  me  not  be  misunderstood.  I  regard  the 
critical  method  of  the  historian  as  indispensable;  but  this  very 
method  is  imperfect  if  it  does  not  reckon  with  ethical  and  imagina- 
tive values  as  well. 

But  to  proceed  no  further  with  this  arraignment  of  the  age,  let 
me  conclude  by  referring  to  the  hardest  problem  of  all,  which  has 
been  gradually  accumulating  for  our  generation,  namely,  the  pres- 
ence of  various  modern  literatures  of  great  power  and  beauty, 
which  were  only  beginning  to  exist  when  the  humanists  based  all 
teaching  on  the  classics.  May  not  the  literature  of  any  of  the  great 
nations  of  Europe  serve  the  purpose  as  effectively?  How  can  we 
neglect  any  of  them,  and  how  can  we  elect?  Further,  I  would 
inquire,  how  have  we  teachers  of  the  classics  fulfilled  our  tasks? 
Have  we  always  kept  before  us  the  true  ideal  of  humanism  ?  Have 
we  made  the  sacred  past  living  and  contemporary,  or  have  we 
banished  our  subject  to  a  timeless  district,  illumined,  not  by  the 
dry  light  of  reason,  which  is  a  wholesome  effluence,  but  by  the  dry 
darkness  of  the  unprofitable  ?  I  raise  these  issues  contentedly,  and 
bequeath  them  to  the  other  speakers  at  this  meeting.  With  many 
startling  leaps  down  the  centuries,  and,  I  fear,  with  many  hasty 
generalizations,  I  have  at  least  made  clear  that  the  true  program 
of  humanism,  which  is  nothing  but  the  ancient  program  revived, 
has  always  pointed  men  to  the  treasured  ideals  of  the  past,  and 
inspired  them  to  action  in  the  present. 


XV 

MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY1 

By  Charles  Grosvenor  Osgood 

The  importance  of  Greek  and  Roman  mythology  is  proved  by 
its  unfailing  vitality.  After  the  visible  forms  of  states  and  empires 
had  passed  away,  the  myths  of  the  ancients  survived  with  their 
politics  and  philosophy  and  poetry  as  a  part  of  the  heritage  which 
the  new  peoples  received  from  the  old.  This  power  of  classical 
myths  to  survive  is  explained  principally  by  two  facts:  first,  they 
were  the  embodiment  of  the  moral,  religious,  and  artistic  ideals  of 
the  Greeks  and  Romans ;  secondly,  morality,  religion,  and  art  were 
serious  and  fundamental  realities  in  ancient  life. 

These  two  facts  explain  also  the  kind  of  vitality  by  which  the 
myths  have  survived.  It  consists  not  merely  in  the  repetition  of 
a  tale  through  centuries,  but  also  in  the  variation  of  its  quality,  and 
in  its  susceptibility  to  employment  for  various  uses.  The  old 
mythology  was  a  kind  of  plastic  material  which  received  through 
individuals  a  national  impress.  As  the  life  of  the  Greeks  became 
modified  from  century  to  century,  so  Greek  mythology  was  similarly 
modified  by  the  poets,  teachers,  philosophers,  and  artists  who  were 
the  master- workmen  of  this  people.  The  stories  and  conceptions  of 
gods  and  heroes  are  strong,  aspiring,  or  weak,  as  the  people  who 
invented  and  cherished  them  manifested  the  corresponding  quali-  - 
ties.  And  when  the  Roman  civilization  adopted  Greek  culture, 
Greek  mythology  suffered  modification,  and  became  in  some  degree 
a  reflex  of  the  Roman  life  into  which  it  had  entered. 

The  poet  who  was  religious,  and  hence  peculiarly  and  continually 
sensitive  to  moral  truth,  found  in  existing  mythology  a  partial 
expression  of  the  truths  dear  to  him,  and  in  his  poetic  treatment 
added  to  the  moral,  religious,  or  imaginative  value  of  the  myth 

[i  From  The  Classical  Mythology  of  Milton's  English  Poems  (pp.  x-xxxii). 
Professor  Osgood's  excellent  dissertation  appeared  as  No.  8  in  Yale  Studies  in 
English,  edited  by  Albert  S.  Cook.  The  present  extract  is  reprinted  with  the 
author's  consent,  slightly  abridged  both  in  the  text  and  the  footnotes.  Ref- 
erences from  this  to  other  parts  of  the  dissertation  have  been  omitted*. — Editor.] 


200  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

which  he  employed.  Reverence  as  well  as  imagination  characterizes 
such  treatment.  We  feel  it  in  the  mythology  of  poets  like  Homer, 
Plato,  and  Virgil.  Thus  in  the  first  book  of  the  Iliad,  where  Chryses 
prayed  for  revenge  upon  Agamemnon,  'Phoebus  Apollo  heard  him, 
and  came  down  from  the  peaks  of  Olympus  wroth  at  heart,  bearing 
on  his  shoulders  his  bow  and  covered  quiver.  And  the  arrows 
clanged  upon  his  shoulders  in  his  wrath,  as  the  god  moved ;  and  he 
descended  like  to  night.'2  This  passage  not  only  shows  Homer's 
imagination  in  its  vividness  and  dramatic  power,  but  contains  moral 
enthusiasm  for  divine  justice,  and  reverence  for,  ihiiu-sttpegior  aad 
majestic  power  of  the  god.  But  Homer's  reverence  had  a  lower 
object  than  that  of  either  Plato  or  the  Christian.  His  ideal  oi> 
conduct,  as  represented  by  his  heroes,  and  magnified  in  his  divini* 
ties,  was  nourished  by  a  smaller  life  and  a  lower  conception  of  the 
universe  than  the  Platonic  or  the  Christian  ideal.  His  greatest  men 
and  women  are  brave,  dignified,  and  generous,  sometimes  even 
tender.  Yet  they  treat  their  enemies  with  horrible  cruelty,  they 
violate  our  ideas  of  moral  purity,  and  they  exhibit  lack  of  self- 
control  and  fear  of  death.*  Already  in  the  palmy  days  of  Greek 
civilization  Plato  criticizes  them  for  such  shortcomings.3 

The  reverence  of  this  poet-philosopher  for  mythology  was  not 
based  upon  a  literal  belief  in  the  old  religion.  He  appreciated  the 
beauty  of  some  of  its  myths,  and  saw  that  they  were  sufficiently 
plastic  to  receive  his  teaching.  In  his  adaptation  he  has  impressed 
them  with  the  imagination,  and  with  the  enthusiasm  and  reverence 
for  truth  which  are  exhibited  in  his  philosophy.  Under  the  influ- 
ence of  his  higher  and  larger  ideals  and  conceptions,  mythology 
underwent  a  sort  of  expansion.  It  was  sublimated,  rarefied,  and 
projected  into  larger  space.  It  received  a  nobler  form  than  that 
which  it  possessed  in  Homer.  At  the  same  time,  however,  it 
assumed  a  new  function ;  it  became  symbolic  and  almost  allegorical. 
Thus  in  the  Phaedrus,  where  Plato  is  discussing  the  upward  flight 
of  the  perfect  soul,  he  says:  'Now  the  divine  is  beauty,  wisdom, 
goodness,  and  the  like ;  and  by  these  the  wing  of  the  soul  is  nour- 
ished, and  grows  apace;  .  .  .  Zeus,  the  mighty  lord  holding  the 
reins  of  a  winged  chariot,  leads  the  way  in  heaven,  ordering  all 
and  caring  for  all;  and  there  follows  him  the  heavenly  array  of 
gods  and  demi-gods,  divided  into  eleven  bands;  for  only  Hestia  is 
left  at  home  in  the  house  of  heaven;  but  the  rest  of  the  twelve 
greater  deities  march  in  their  appointed  order.     And  they  see  in 

2  Iliad  1.  45. 

s  Republic  3.  386. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       201 

the  interior  of  heaven  many  blessed  sights;  and  there  are  ways  to 
and  fro,  along  which  the  happy  gods  are  passing,  each  one  fulfilling 
his  own  work;  and  any  one  may  follow  who  pleases,  for  jealousy 
has  no  place  in  the  heavenly  choir.  This  is  within  the  heaven. 
But  when  they  go  to  feast  and  festival,  then  they  move  right  up 
the  steep  ascent,  and  mount  the  top  of  the  dome  of  heaven.'4  To 
appreciate  more  fully  the  difference  between  Homer  and  Plato, 
this  passage  should  be  compared  with  the  famous  feast  of  the  gods 
in  the  first  book  of  the  Iliad,5  where  jealous  Hera  stirs  a  quarrel 
with  Zeus;  but  at  his  threats  'the  ox-eyed  queen  was  afraid,  and 
sat  in  silence,  curbing  her  heart;  but  throughout  Zeus'  palace  the 
gods  of  heaven  were  troubled.'  Then  the  drollery  of  Hephaestus 
made  a  truce,  and  'laughter  unquenchable  arose  amid  the  blessed 
gods  to  see  Hephaestus  bustling  through  the  palace.' 

An  allegorical  and  naturalistic  application  of  mythology  was 
made  by  Plutarch.  The  attempt  was  afterwards  made  to  identify 
many  myths  with  early  or  sacred  history  through  euhemeristic 
interpretation,  or  to  discover  in  them  an  allegorical  form  of  Chris- 
tian and  moral  truth.  Such  uses  of  mythology  find  early  prece- 
dent in  a  euhemerist  like  Diodorus,  or  a  moralist  like  Plutarch. 
They  were  later  practised  by  certain  of  the  Fathers,  such  as  Euse- 
bius,  and  were  resumed  with  great  enthusiasm  by  scientific  writers 
of  the  Renaissance,  such  as  Bacon  and  Bochart. 

In  the  times  of  Greek  and  Roman  decadence,  when  faith  in  the 
old  religion  had  died,  leaving  empty  the  hearts  of  men,  and  when 
morality  was  by  many  regarded  as  inconvenient  and  unnecessary, 
the  treatment  of  a  myth  in  art  became  correspondingly  irreligious 
and  non-moral.  As  a  diverting  tale  it  admitted  of  imaginative 
treatment  only.  A  Horace  or  a  Claudian  made  it  serve  as  a  dainty 
and  effective  ornament.  Ovid  clothed  the  old  stories  in  new  apparel 
and  ornament,  and,  thus  renovated,  they  gave  the  world  fresh 
amusement;  his  importance  to  us  as  a  mythologist  consists  much 
less  in  any  moral  or  artistic  excellence  of  his  treatment  than  in  his 
great  accumulation  of  mythological  material  from  sources  many  of 
which  have  long  since  disappeared. 

Having  thus  considered  the  vitality  of  ancient  myths  as  illus- 
trated by  their  varying  quality  and  the  various  ways  in  which  they 
were  applied,  we  may  ask  whether  this  vitality  has  failed  at  last, 
or  whether  it  is  so  great  that  the  myths  may  live  with  us  a  life  in 

*  Phaedrus  246,  247.    Compare  also  the  use  of  mythology  in  the  story  of  the 
journey  of  Er,  Bepublic  10.  614-621. 
5  Iliad  1.  493-600. 


/ 


202  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

some  degree  as  intimate  as  that  which  they  lived  with  the  ancients. 
When  Christian  civilization  supplanted  that  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
it  seemed  likely  that  pagan  mythology  would  perish  with  the  old 
order  of  things.  It  was  too  closely  interwoven  with  earlier  belief  to 
survive  the  antagonism  of  the  new  faith,  which  first  dreaded  the 
ancient  world,  and  then  triumphed  over  it.  Within  the  last  five 
hundred  years  classical  mythology  has  been  partially  revived,  gen- 
erally as  a  relic  or  a  plaything.  But  whether  it  can  again  receive 
the  inspiring  power  of  revelation  which  it  possessed  for  many  of 
the  ancients  remains  a  question.  The  answer  to  such  a  question 
we  may  hope  to  find  by  a  study  of  this  element  in  the  art  of 
Milton.  .  .  . 

Let  us  now  consider  some  of  the  principal  facts  revealed  by  an 
examination  of  the  classical  mythology  in  Milton's  poems.  His 
methods  of  introducing  such  allusions  are  principally  three.  First, 
they  may  be  introduced  in  simile  or  comparison.  Thus  in  the 
Second  Book  of  Paradise  Lost  he  describes  the  turmoil  of  the  fiends 
who 

Rend  up  both  rocks  and  hills,  and  ride  the  air 
In  whirlwind ;  Hell  scarce  holds  the  wild  uproar — 
As  when  Alcides  from  Oechalia  crowned 
With  conquest,  felt  the  envenomed  robe,  and  tore 
Through  pain  up  by  the  roots  Thessalian  pines, 
And  Lichas  from  the  top  of  Oeta  threw 
Into  the  Euboic  Sea.6 

At  times  the  comparison  may  be  very  brief,  as  when  the  beasts 
are  represented  more  obedient  to  the  call  of  Eve 

Than  at  Circean  call  the  herd  disguised.7 

Or  it  may  even  not  exceed  the  mere  mention  of  'Typhoean  rage'8 
or  'Atlantean  shoulders.'9 

Milton  often  masses  classical  allusions  of  this  kind,  piling  them 
sometimes  four  or  five  deep,  and  obtaining  by  means  of  this  accu- 
mulation an  effect  of  great  richness.  Thus  of  the  tempter  disguised 
as  a  serpent  he  says : 

«  Paradise  Lost  2.  540-546. 

7  Ibid.  9.  522;  cf.  4.  250;  5. 16,  378;  10.  559;  Vacation  Exercise  93. 

s  Paradise  Lost  2.  539. 

»Ioid.  2.306;  cf.  655;  3.359;  10.444;  Sonnets  15.7. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       203 

Pleasing  was  his  shape 
And  lovely ;  never  since  of  serpent  kind 
Lovelier — not  those  that  in  Illyria  changed 
Hermione  and  Cadmus,  or  the  god 
In  Epidaurus ;  nor  to  which  transformed 
Ammonian  Jove,  or  Capitoline,  was  seen, 
He  with  Olympias,  this  with  her  who  bore 
Scipio  the  highth  of  Rome.10 

Even  supposing  that  the  reader  is  not  familiar  with  all  the  allu- 
sions of  this  passage,  the  very  succession  of  sonorous  vowels  and 
liquids,  which  Milton  so  often  effected  by  his  choice  and  arrange- 
ment of  proper  names,  enhances  the  splendor  of  this  massed  com- 
parison. In  some  eases  such  comparisons  are  reinforced  or  extended 
by  allusions  which  are  not  mythological  or  even  classical.  Or 
mythological  allusions  introduced  for  another  purpose  than  com- 
parison may  occur  in  close  connection  with  these  passages.  It  is  by 
such  treatment  that  the  description  of  Eden,  in  the  Fourth  Book  of 
Paradise  Lost,11  expresses  through  its  own  rich  luxuriance  the 
luxuriance  of  the  garden.  We  hear  first  the  sound  of  clear  water 
running  over  beds  of  pearl  and  gold,  now  sparkling  in  the  sun,  now 
lost  in  the  green  twilight  of  deep  woods.  Against  the  dark  foliage 
is  the  gleam  of  fruits  with  golden  rind,  'Hesperian  fables  true.' 
The  air  is  filled  with  the  fragrance  of  gorgeous  flowers  and  with  the 
soft  call  of  unseen  birds.  Where  the  leafy  branches  part  little 
vistas  invite  exploration. 

Airs,  vernal  airs, 
Breathing  the  smell  of  field  and  grove,  attune 
The  trembling  leaves,  while  universal  Pan, 
Knit  with  the  Graces  and  the  Hours  in  dance, 
Led  on  the  eternal  Spring.    Not  that  fair  field 
Of  Enna,  where  Proserpin  gathering  flowers, 
Herself  a  fairer  flower,  by  gloomy  Dis 
Was  gathered — which  cost  Ceres  all  that  pain 
To  seek  her  through  the  world — nor  that  sweet  grove 
Of  Daphne,  by  Orontes  and  the  inspired 
Castalian  spring,  might  with  this  Paradise 
Of  Eden  strive ;  nor  that  Nyseian  isle, 
Girt  with  the  river  Triton,  where  old  Cham, 
Whom  Gentiles  Ammon  call  and  Libyan  Jove, 

10  Paradise  Lost  9.  503-510. 
ii  Ibid.  4.  205-287. 


204  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

Hid  Amalthea,  and  her  florid  son, 

Young  Bacchus,  from  his  stepdame  Rhea's  eye; 

Nor  where  Abassin  kings  their  issue  guard, 

Mount  Amara,  though  this  by  some  supposed 

True  Paradise,  under  the  Ethiop  line 

By  Nilus'  head,  enclosed  with  shining  rock, 

A  whole  day's  journey  high,  but  wide  remote 

From  this  Assyrian  garden,  where  the  Fiend 

Saw  undelighted  all  delight,  all  kind 

Of  living  creatures,  new  to  sight  and  strange. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  Eden  has  been  compared  to  three  mythical 
gardens,  and  then  to  a  garden  of  Abyssinia,  and  that  besides  these 
allusions,  reference  is  also  made  to  the  Hesperides,  to  Pan,  the 
Graces,  and  the  Hours.  This  method  of  accumulation  or  massing 
of  mythology  is  not  confined  to  similes,  but  is  also  practised  in 
other  connections,  as  we  shall  see  later. 

Here  we  may  pause  to  consider  a  characteristic  of  all  great  art 
which  attempts  to  interpret  the  beauty  of  the  natural  world  to 
men.  Every  work  of  art  which  maintains  a  strong  and  permanent 
influence  over  men  contains  some  element  which  brings  it  in  touch 
with  humanity.  However  divine  the  truth  which  the  artist  feels, 
however  radiant  the  beauty  of  nature  is  to  him,  his  art  is  incom- 
plete if  his  thoughts  of  these  things  are  not  brought  home  to  men 
in  terms  of  human  life.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  a  painting  or  a 
description  of  a  landscape  which  reproduces  simply  the  landscape 
itself  is  imperfect.  The  best  art  therefore  personifies  the  forces 
of  nature,  or  perhaps  is  content  with  suggesting  types  or  phases 
of  human  life  which  seem  to  correspond  in  spirit  to  the  particular 
type  or  phase  of  nature.  It  is  thus  that  in  Corot's  pictures  of  the 
glad  morning,  figures  are  seen  dancing,  or  blithe  and  tuneful 
Orpheus  appears,  giving  utterance  to  the  joyful  harmony  around 
him.  In  Milton's  description  of  Eden  the  same  principle  applies 
to  the  mention  of  Pan  and  the  Hours.  Furthermore,  in  the  com- 
parisons occurring  here  Milton  has  not  stopped  with  mere  allu- 
sions to  myths,  as  in  his  description  of  the  serpent-fiend,  but  has 
outlined  in  his  concise  and  significant  way  the  stories  of  Proserpina 
and  Amalthea,  and  has  suggested  the  voice  heard  in  the  Castalian 
spring  sacred  to  the  Apollo  and  Daphne  of  the  Orient,  thus  fur- 
nishing appropriate  personal  types  to  reflect  the  natural  beauty 
previously  described. 

Of  all  the  allusions  to  mythology  in  simile  by  far  the  greatest 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       205 

strength  and  finest  balance  are  found  in  a  certain  double  mythologi- 
cal simile  in  the  Fourth  Book  of  Paradise  Regained,  in  which  each 
member  is  firmly  and  concisely  outlined.  It  is  where  Satan,  in  the 
last  temptation,  commands  Christ  to  leap  from  a  pinnacle  of  the 
temple : 

To  whom  thus  Jesus:  'Also  it  is  written 
' '  Tempt  not  the  Lord  thy  God. ' '  '    He  said,  and  stood. 
But  Satan,  smitten  with  amazement,  fell. 
As  when  Earth's  son,  Antaeus  (to  compare 
Small  things  with  greatest),  in  Irassa  strove 
With  Jove's  Alcides,  and,  oft  foiled,  still  rose, 
Receiving  from  his  mother  Earth  new  strength, 
Fresh  from  his  fall,  and  fiercer  grapple  joined, 
Throttled  at  length  in  the  air  expired  and  fell ; 
So,  after  many  a  foil,  the  Tempter  proud, 
Renewing  fresh  assaults,  amidst  his  pride 
Fell  whence  he  stood  to  see  his  victor  fall. 
And,  as  that  Theban  monster  that  proposed 
Her  riddle,  and  him  who  solved  it  not  devoured, 
That  once  found  out  and  solved,  for  grief  and  spite 
Cast  herself  headlong  from  the  Ismenian  steep, 
So,  strook  with  dread  and  anguish,  fell  the  Fiend.12 

It  may  be  observed  that  the  similes  and  comparisons  which  have 
been  cited  are  all  from  Paradise  Lost  and  Paradise  Regained.  We 
may  say  that  with  few  exceptions,  principally  in  Comus,  this 
manner  of  introducing  mythological  allusion  is  peculiar  to  these 
two  longer  and  later  poems  ;13  but  it  is  not  just  to  infer  from  this 

12  Paradise  Regained  4.  560-576.  The  strength  of  this  passage  is  not  due  alone 
to  the  balance  of  these  two  similes,  nor  to  the  fact  that  not  more  than  two  are 
used.  It  lies  partly  in  the  grandeur  of  diction,  but  most  of  all  in  the  deeper 
meaning  common  to  the  three  solemn  events  here  described.  Each  is  the  victory 
of  a  hero ;  each  is  the  triumph  of  right  over  wrong,  of  light  over  darkness ;  and 
in  each  struggle  is  involved  the  fate  of  generations.  The  comparison  of  Christ 
to  Heracles  is  implied  in  Passion  13.  The  idea  may  have  been  suggested  to 
Milton  by  some  writer  of  the  Renaissance,  or  more  likely  by  one  of  the  Fathers. 
Cf.  Paradise  Lost  2.1017-1020;  4.713-719. 

is  In  Samson  Agonistes,  the  nature  of  the  subject  and  the  form  in  which  it 
was  cast  naturally  prevented  almost  entirely  the  use  of  Greek  mythology. 
Neither  Samson  nor  his  friends  and  enemies  could  very  appropriately  be  made 
to  talk  of  things  so  far  removed  from  them  as  classical  myths,  and  in  the  drama 
the  poet  may  not  appear  in  person,  as  in  the  epic,  to  make  these  allusions  in  his 
own  name.     Strictly,  only  one  such  allusion  occurs  in  this  dramatic  poem,  and 


206  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

that  Milton  ultimately  came  to  prefer  such  a  form  of  allusion.  It 
seems  more  likely  that  the  subjects  of  the  two  epics  offered  so  little 
opportunity  for  the  incorporation  of  classical  mythology  within  the 
story  itself  that,  if  the  poems  were  to  be  enriched  to  any  extent  by 
means  of  pagan  lore,  it  must  be  accomplished  by  the  somewhat 
more  remote  method  of  simile  and  comparison. 

A  second  method  of  introducing  allusions  to  classical  mythology 
is  illustrated  in  nearly  all  the  poems,  though  the  earlier  and  so- 
called  minor  poems  supply  the  best  examples.  It  consists  in  the 
incorporation  of  a  myth  or  the  ancient  conception  of  a  divinity  into 
a  poetical  setting  of  Milton's  own  creation. 

This  is  accomplished  in  two  distinct  ways.  First,  the  myth  or 
conception,  of  which  the  several  details  may  come  from  several 
different  sources,  may  be  removed,  for  example,  from  the  peculiar 
setting  of  Homer,  Apollonius,  or  Ovid,  and  placed  in  the  different 
setting  of  Comus,  II  Penseroso,  or  the  First  and  Second  Books  of 
Paradise  Lost.  Thus  the  indefinite  and  shadowy  classical  idea  of 
Chaos,  as  either  a  place  or  a  divinity,  or  merely  an  unordered  con- 
dition of  things,  has  been  elaborated  under  Milton's  treatment,  and 
separated  into  two  distinct  meanings  in  the  cosmography  of  Para- 
dise Lost.  On  the  one  hand,  the  word  is  applied  to  the  deep  and 
confused  region  between  heaven  and  hell.  On  the  other,  it  names 
the  divinity  who  rules  in  this  region.  The  principal  source  of  the 
latter  conception  is  in  Hesiod,  though  his  representation  is  much 
less  definite  than  Milton's,  and  amounts  to  little  more  than  a  per- 
sonification of  a  condition  in  the  order  of  nature's  earliest  devel- 
opment. In  Paradise  Lost  the  consort  of  Chaos,  and  his  co-ruler, 
is  Night.  The  Miltonic  conception  of  Night  is  based  upon  that  of 
the  Orphic  cosmogony,  which  makes  her  eldest  and  first  of  all  things. 
Thus  the  two  early  Greek  cosmogonies  are  combined,  and  intro- 
duced into  the  Second  Book  of  Milton's  great  epic.  By  the  same 
method,  Saturn  and  Jove  and  the  other  Greek  gods  are  made  to 
appear  among  the  devils,  the  most  conspicuous  of  them  all  being 

that  a  very  remote  one.  It  is  where  Samson  accuses  himself  of  revealing  God's 
secrets, 

a  sin 
That  Gentiles  in  their  parables  condemn 
To  their  abyss  and  horrid  pains  confined. 

(499-501.) 
He  evidently  means  Tantalus  and  Prometheus.     But  in  addition  to  this  one 
instance  I  have  also  discussed  in  their  respective  places  the  references  to  the 
Chalybeans  (133),  to  'dire  Necessity'  (1666),  and  to  the  phoenix  (1699),  as 
being  mythological  and  having  their  probable  sources  among  classical  writers. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       207 

Hephaestus,  or  Mulciber,  the  skilful  craftsman  and  architect  of 
Pandemonium.14  In  Paradise  Regained,  naiads,  wood-nymphs,  and 
the  'ladies  of  the  Hesperides'  figure  in  the  temptation  of  Christ,  and 
harpies  snatch  away  the  feast  which  has  been  spread  by  Satan.16 
Much  of  the  mythology  of  the  earlier  poems  is  introduced  in  this 
manner.  Thus  in  Arcades  the  Arcadian  background  is  suggested 
by  the  presence  of  silver-buskined  nymphs  and  gentle  swains,  these 
latter  being  the  descendants 

Of  that  renowned  flood,  so  often  sung, 
Divine  Alpheus,  who,  by  secret  sluice, 
Stole  under  seas  to  meet  his  Arethuse. 

And  the  last  song  of  the  poem  is  musical  with  the  sweetness  of  such 
names  as  Ladon,  Cyllene,  Erymanth,  and  Lycaeus,  places  dear  to 
Pan  and  the  nymphs.  In  Comus  the  element  of  enchantment  and 
sensuality  is  largely  composed  of  references  to  Bacchus  and  Circe. 
It  also  includes  the  mention  of  dark-veiled  Cotytto,  who  rides  with 
Hecate  through  the  night,  concealing  the  wicked  excesses  of  her 
worshipers.  The  magic  song  of  Circe  and  the  sirens  quiets  the 
rage  of  Scylla  and  Charybdis,  and  Comus  is  consigned  to  be  girt 
with  harpies  and  hydras,  and 

With  all  the  griesly  legions  that  troop 
Under  the  sooty  flag  of  Acheron. 

This  element  of  sensuality  in  Comus  is  offset,  on  the  other  hand,  by 
an  element  of  purity  and  benignity.  The  latter  is  composed  of 
references  to  the  high  air  of  Jove's  court,  to  the  propitious  aid  of 
Neptune  and  all  sea-gods,  to  the  glory  of  Iris,  the  sweetness  of 
Echo,  the  virgin  majesty  of  Diana  and  Minerva.  It  is  sustained 
at  the  end  by  a  description  of  the  paradise  of  Virtue,  where  the 
Hesperides  sing,  and  whither  the  Graces  and  Hours  bring  abun- 
dance. Here  the  air  is  cooled  with  Elysian  dew,  and  here  sleeps  the 
translated  Adonis.  Here  Love  is  reunited  with  Psyche,  and  to  them 
are  born  Youth  and  Joy.16    L' Allegro  and  II  Penseroso  should  be 

i«  Paradise  Lost  1.  732-751. 

is  Paradise  Regained  2.  353-357,  403. 

i«  It  is  worthy  of  notice  in  passing,  that  Milton,  in  making  Youth  and  Joy 
the  children  of  Psyche  and  the  celestial  Cupid,  has  transcended  the  grosser  treat- 
ment of  Apuleius,  who  makes  Voluptas  their  daughter.  Spenser  is  content  with 
this  version,  and  calls  her  Pleasure.  Cf .  Spenser  Faerie  Queene  3.  6.  50 ;  Hymne 
of  Love  288.  A  comparison  of  these  passages  in  Spenser  with  the  closing  speech 
of  Comus  reveals  the  principal  difference  between  Milton 's  method  of  treatment 


208  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

mentioned  as  important  examples  of  this  manner  of  treatment.  In 
these  poems  Milton  has  selected  certain  conceptions  of  the  ancient 
divinities,  and  expressed  them  through  the  scenes  and  activities 
occurring  in  the  life  of  a  refined  man.  It  is  the  light  spirit  of 
Zephyr  and  Aurora  which  predominates  in  the  one  poem,  and  the 
sombre  spirit  of  Vesta  and  Saturn  which  predominates  in  the 
other.  .  .  . 

Occasionally,  instead  of  removing  the  whole  myth  from  its  classi- 
cal setting  and  inserting  it  in  his  own,  Milton  adapts  certain  mytho- 
logical events  or  features  by  removing  from  them  the  persons  and 
localities  with  which  they  are  connected  in  his  sources,  and  substi- 
tuting his  own  persons  and  localities.  This  is  the  second  way  in 
which  mythology  is  incorporated  or  inwoven  with  his  story.  One 
instance  is  Eve's  story  of  discovering  her  own  beauty.17  It  is 
Ovid's  story  of  Narcissus  and  his  love  for  the  face  that  he  saw 
reflected  in  the  water  of  a  spring,  except  that  Eve  is  put  for  Nar- 
cissus. Milton,  as  usual,  follows  many  of  the  details  of  his  original, 
but  by  a  process  of  selection  and  exclusion  renders  them  more 
delicate.  The  same  sort  of  adaptation  occurs  when  Milton  derives 
incidents  from  the  visit  of  Odysseus  to  Circe  in  the  Odyssey,™  and 
inserts  them  in  his  story  of  Comus  and  the  lady.  As  Circe  by 
means  of  her  drug  and  wand  changes  all  strangers  to  swine,  so 
Comus  with  his  orient  liquor  and  wand  changes  travelers  into 
brutish  forms.  As  Odysseus  was  protected  against  these  charms  by 
the  moly,  so  the  good  spirit  checks  the  magic  of  Comus  with  a  plant 
called  haemony.    Again,  in  the  battle  between  the  rebel  angels  and 

and  Spenser's.  The  latter  poet  is  nearly  always  the  more  diffuse.  Though  the 
amount  of  mythology  in  his  considerably  larger  body  of  poetry  appears  to  be 
much  greater  than  in  Milton,  yet  it  represents  less  extensive  reading  in  the 
classics,  and  covers  a  range  of  allusion  no  wider,  if  as  wide.  Milton 's  wonderful 
conciseness  is  of  great  artistic  import,  as  one  of  the  necessary  elements  of  his 
classicism.  Without  the  composure,  reticence,  and  finish  which  this  implies,  no 
work  of  art  is  truly  Hellenic.  We  feel  that  Milton  has  gained  these  traits,  or 
at  least  has  developed  them,  through  direct  contact  with  pure  Greek  culture. 
We  feel,  on  the  other  hand,  that,  however  much  Latin  and  Greek  Spenser  read, 
he  was  in  some  degree  perverted  by  the  restless  and  unsettled  spirit  of  the  early 
Eenaissance  from  a  deep  and  just  sense  of  true  classicism.  He  is  therefore  less 
faithful  to  originals.  His  mythology  has  more  the  nature  of  external  ornament 
rather  profusely  applied.  There  is  evidence  that,  like  the  Italians,  he  was  more 
charmed  with  its  sensuous  and  even  sometimes  fleshly  aspect  than  with  the 
deeper  spiritual  significance — which  indeed  he  may  have  perceived.  It  is  in 
this  way  that  his  treatment  becomes  more  lavish  of  epithet,  color,  and  circum- 
stance than  Milton's. 

17  Paradise  Lost  4.  453-469. 

is  Odyssey  10. 135-574. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       209 

the  army  of  God,  many  incidents  are  transferred  from  Hesiod's 
battle  of  the  Titans  and  the  gods.  Since  the  occasion  and  general 
character  of  these  two  struggles,  as  well  as  certain  details,  are 
similar,  a  comparison  of  the  two  descriptions  as  a  whole  would  be 
profitable.  We  have  space,  however,  only  to  point  out  a  few  details 
in  the  Theogony  which  are  adapted  by  Milton.  Hesiod  tells  us  that 
the  gods,  taking  great  masses  of  rock  in  their  hands,  hurled  them 
upon  the  Titans.  Zeus,  without  exerting  his  full  strength,  smote 
the  Titans  with  his  thunderbolt,  and  drove  them  into  the  depths  of 
Tartarus,  whither  an  anvil  could  not  fall  in  nine  days.  Here  they 
are  confined  for  ever.  Nearly  the  same  incidents  are  repeated  in 
Hesiod 's  story  of  the  fight  between  Zeus  and  Typhoeus.  In  Milton 
these  details  all  appear  with  slight  modification.  As  the  Son  of 
God  advanced  to  battle,  the  steadfast  empyrean  shook  beneath  the 
wheels  of  his  chariot,  'yet  half  his  strength  he  put  not  forth.'  His 
warriors 

plucked  the  seated  hills,  with  all  their  load, 
Rocks,  waters,  woods,  and,  by  the  shaggy  tops 
Uplifting,  bore  them  in  their  hands.19 

He  himself  hurled  his  thunders  upon  the  host  of  Satan,  who  fell 
headlong  from  Heaven: 

Nine  days  they  fell ;  confounded  Chaos  roared, 
And  felt  tenfold  confusion  in  their  fall 
Through  his  wild  anarchy ;  so  huge  a  rout 
Encumbered  him  with  ruin.    Hell  at  last, 
Yawning,  received  them  whole,  and  on  them  closed.20 

is  Paradise  Lost  6.  644-646. 

20  Ibid.  6.  871-875.  Many  instances  of  this  treatment  exist  in  Milton.  The 
descent  of  Raphael  in  5.  277-287  is  derived  in  part  from  similar  descriptions  of 
Hermes  in  Virgil  and  Homer  (Aeneid  4.  222  ff. ;  Iliad  24.  341).  When  in  Para- 
dise Lost  8.  59  the  poet  says,  speaking  of  Eve, 

With  goddess-like  demeanor  forth  she  went, 
Not  unattended;  for  on  her  as  Queen 
A  pomp  of  winning  Graces  waited  still, 

he  is  thinking  of  a  conception  of  Venus,  or  Aphrodite,  which  is  very  common  in 
the  classics,  and  is  illustrated  in  Odyssey  8.  364,  where  the  Graces  bathe  and 
anoint  the  goddess.  Cf.  the  Homeric  Hymn  to  Aphrodite  3.  61 ;  Horace,  Carm. 
1. 4;  1.  30;  3.  21.  In  Paradise  Lost  8.  510,  where  Adam  leads  Eve  to  the  nuptial 
bower,  Earth  and  the  powers  of  nature  'gave  sign  of  gratulation. •  The  situa- 
tion is  similar  to  one  in  Aeneid  4. 165,  where  Earth  and  the  storm  show  approval 
of  the  union  of  Dido  and  Aeneas  in  a  cave.  The  amorous  words  addressed  by 
guilty  Adam  to  Eve  {Paradise  Lost  9. 1029-1033)  are  much  like  those  spoken 


210  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

We  may  now  consider  the  third  method  by  which  Milton  intro- 
duces allusions  to  classical  mythology.  His  descriptions  of  nature 
are  generally  either  mythological  or  touched  with  mythology.  Espe- 
cially is  this  true  in  descriptions  of  the  dawn,  of  night,  and  of  the 
progress  of  the  sun  and  moon.21 

We  have  already  noticed  how  Milton  can  enliven  and  illuminate 
a  description  of  natural  beauty  by  throwing  into  it  a  touch  of 
human  life  which  reflects  the  spirit  of  that  which  he  is  describing. 
This  is  what  Shakespeare  does  in  peopling  the  forest  of  Arden  with 
blithe  spirits  who  make  us  forget  that  trees  are  not  always  green, 
and  brooks  merry;  and  in  Milton  the  same  result  is  produced  by 
reflecting  the  spirit  of  nature  from  the  personalities  of  the  old 
gods,  often  slightly  modified  by  the  poet's  art.  It  is  thus  that  he 
tells  of  the  beginning  of  another  day : 

Now  Morn,  her  rosy  steps  in  the  eastern  clime 
Advancing,  sowed  the  earth  with  orient  pearl.22 

And  again  he  speaks  of  the  Sun, 

who,  scarce  uprisen, 
With  wheels  yet  hovering  o  'er  the  ocean-brim, 
Shot  parallel  to  the  earth  his  dewy  ray, 
Discovering  in  wide  landskip  all  the  east.28 

While  it  is  true  that  Milton  humanizes  nature  by  means  of 
mythology,  we  may  go  further,  or  perhaps  reverse  the  statement, 

by  Paris  to  Helen  in  Iliad  3.  442,  or  by  Zeus  to  Hera  in  Iliad  14.  315.  In  Para- 
dise Lost  11. 184-203,  the  eagle  appears  as  a  bird  of  omen  in  the  manner  of 
Aeneid  1.  393-397;  12.  247-256.  The  description  of  the  bounds  of  Hell  in  Para- 
dise Lost  2.  645  ff.  bears  traces  of  similar  descriptions  in  Homer,  Hesiod,  and 
Virgil.  The  sound  of  Hell 's  gates  in  Paradise  Lost  2.  879-882  suggests  as  an 
original  Aeneid  6.  573-574.  In  Paradise  Lost  2.  752-758,  Sin  is  represented  as 
springing  from  the  head  of  Satan,  as  Athena  sprang  from  the  head  of  Zeus. 
When  Satan  was  wounded  (Paradise  Lost  6.  320  ff.), 

A  stream  of  nectarous  humor  issuing  flowed 
Sanguine,  such  as  celestial  Spirits  may  bleed. 

So  Homer  speaks  of  the  wounded  Aphrodite  (Iliad  5.339):  'Then  flowed  the 
immortal  blood  of  the  goddess,  such  ichor  as  floweth  in  the  blessed  gods. ' 

21  Strictly  speaking,  the  use  of  mythology  in  descriptions  of  nature  is  only 
another  application  of  the  second  method  by  which  myths  are  incorporated  into 
Milton's  poetry.  Yet  in  a  consideration  of  its  artistic  excellence  it  falls  more 
conveniently  under  a  separate  head. 

22  Paradise  Lost  5. 1-2. 

23  Ibid.  5. 139-142. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       211 

and  say  that  in  general,  whatever  the  occasion  of  introducing  the 
myth,  if  its  persons  or  incidents  connote  even  in  the  slightest  de- 
gree the  beauty  or  the  power  of  nature,  Milton  makes  us  feel  it. 
Thus  broad  meadows  and  shady  places  are  made  visible  when  he 
speaks  in  Comus  of 

such  court  guise 

As  Mercury  did  first  devise 

With  the  mincing  Dryades 

On  the  lawns,  and  on  the  leas.24 

The  sound  of  the  sea  is  suggested  in  the  following  lines: 

Scylla  wept, 
And  chid  her  barking  waves  into  attention, 
And  fell  Charybdis  murmured  soft  applause.25 

The  luxuriance  of  spring  is  felt  in  a  reference  to  the  love  of  Zeus 
and  Hera: 

As  Jupiter 

On  Juno  smiles  when  he  impregns  the  clouds 

That  shed  May  flowers.28 

The  name  of  Jove  seems  often  to  suggest  the  upper  air  and  the 
broad  sky.27 

This  consideration  of  the  mythology  in  Milton's  descriptions  of 
nature  is  the  most  important  of  any  thus  far,  since  it  opens  the  way 
to  more  thorough  appreciation  of  his  independence  and  originality, 
and  of  the  true  nature  of  his  classicism  and  his  artistic  tempera- 
ment. 

As  we  approach  these  questions,  the  first  thing  for  us  to  consider 
is  that  the  part  assigned  to  mythology  in  such  descriptions  varies 
widely  in  extent.  One  description  may  be  entirely  made  up  from 
mythology ;  another  may  reveal  only  a  slight  touch  of  it ;  in  a  third 
the  mythical  element  may  be  wholly  lacking,  the  personification 
employed  being  derived  from  another  source.  An  analysis  of  sev- 
eral passages  will  clearly  reveal  the  variation.    In  Lycidas  the  line, 

While  the  still  morn  went  out  with  sandals  gray,28 

24  Comus  962-965. 

25  Ibid.  257-259. 

26  Paradise  Lost  4.  499-501. 

27  This  is  evident  in  Comus,  especially  in  the  beginning,  and  in  the  lines  On 
the  Death  of  a  Fair  Infant  43-46. 

28  Lycidas   187.     The  ancients  did  not  speak  of   the   morning  as  'gray.' 


212  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

contains  no  mythological  allusion.  In  the  same  poem  occur  the 
lines : 

Oft  till  the  star  that  rose  at  evening  bright 

Toward  heaven 's  descent  had  sloped  his  westering  wheel.29 

This  last  passage  contains  only  a  slight  mythical  coloring.  It  con- 
sists in  the  allusion  to  the  star 's  chariot,  an  idea  which  is  more  com- 
monly associated  with  the  sun,  or  moon,  or  night.30  The  mythologi- 
cal element  is  slightly  increased  in  the  following  passage  of  Paradise 
Regained: 

Thus  passed  the  night  so  foul,  till  Morning  fair 
Came  forth  with  pilgrim  steps,  in  amice  gray, 
Who  with  her  radiant  finger  stilled  the  roar 
Of  thunder,  chased  the  clouds,  and  laid  the  winds.31 

The  mention  of  the  Morning's  'radiant  finger'  appears  to  be  an 
adaptation  of  the  Homeric  epithet  'rosy-fingered,'  and  her  action 
in  driving  away  the  clouds  may  be  partly  suggested  by  the  common 
idea  that  she  puts  the  Night  to  rout,  and  partly  by  an  expression 
which  Virgil  uses  of  Neptune.32  The  rest  of  the  passage  is  peculiar 
to  Milton.  Again  in  the  Fifth  Book  of  Paradise  Lost  the  Morning 
Star  is  addressed  as 

Fairest  of  Stars,  last  in  the  train  of  Night, 

If  better  thou  belong  not  to  the  Dawn, 

Sure  pledge  of  day,  that  crown 'st  the  smiling  Morn 

With  thy  bright  circlet.33 

Of  this  passage  the  words  'last  in  the  train  of  Night'  are  all  that 

suggest  the  classical  idea  that  the  stars  are  attendant  upon  Night. 

Let  us  now  examine  a  passage  in  which  the  mythological  element 

is  increased,  even  though  it  is  not  more  conspicuous  than  the  actual 

Milton,  however,  seems  to  have  delighted  in  this  color  as  applied  to  the  morning. 
See  Paradise  Lost  7.373;  Paradise  Regained  4.427;  cf.  the  use  in  Paradise 
Lost  5.186;  L' Allegro  71. 

29  Lycidas  30-31. 

so  Milton  often  used  the  chariot  or  moving  throne  as  an  accessory  in  myths. 
It  occurs  frequently  in  his  reference  to  the  sun,  or  moon,  or  night,  and  is  often 
transferred  to  other  connections.  Examples  are  found  in  Paradise  Lost  1.  786 ; 
2.930;  3.522. 

»i  Paradise  Regained  4.  426-429. 

32  Aeneid  1. 143:  '  Collectasque  fugat  nubes.' 

33  Paradise  Lost  5. 166-169. 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       213 

phenomenon  of  nature  itself.  Referring  to  sunset  and  sunrise, 
Milton  says  in  Lycidas: 

So  sinks  the  day-star  in  the  ocean  bed, 
And  yet  anon  repairs  his  drooping  head, 
And  tricks  his  beams,  and  with  new-spangled  ore 
Flames  in  the  forehead  of  the  morning  sky.34 

In  the  beginning  of  this  passage  we  have  the  old  figure  of  the  god 
Helios  sinking  to  rest  in  his  bed  at  the  end  of  a  long  day's  journey. 
But  as  the  passage  proceeds  this  mythological  idea  fades,  and  in  its 
place  shines  the  brightness  of  the  sun  itself,  like  a  flaming  jewel  in 
the  forehead  of  the  morning.  Still  more  pronounced  is  the  mytho- 
logical character  of  the  following  lines : 

First  in  his  east  the  glorious  Lamp  was  seen, 
Regent  of  day,  and  all  the  horizon  round 
Invested  with  bright  rays,  jocund  to  run 
His  longitude  through  heaven 's  high  road ;  the  gray 
Dawn  and  the  Pleiades  before  him  danced, 
Shedding  sweet  influence.35 

Though  this  passage  is  founded  principally  upon  the  Bible,  yet 
Milton,  in  combining  the  different  parts,  has  given  it  a  decided 
classical  coloring,  slightly  modified  by  characterizing  the  Dawn  as 
'gray';  and  so  nicely  are  the  parts  fitted  together  that  a  seam  is 
imperceptible,  nor  is  it  easy  to  tell  where  classical  mythology  ends 
and  any  other  element  begins. 

The  majority  of  natural  descriptions  in  Milton  resemble  the  last 
four  examples  in  that  they  contain  a  more  or  less  prominent  sug- 
gestion of  the  mythical  conception,  together  with  a  large  element 
of  Milton's  elaboration. 

We  may  now  consider  what  is  more  rare,  namely,  a  description 

«*  Lycidas  168-171. 

35  Paradise  Lost  7.  370-375.  At  least  two  Biblical  passages  are  represented 
by  these  lines.  The  more  important  one  is  Ps.  19.  4-6 :  '  Their  line  is  gone  out 
through  all  the  earth,  and  their  words  to  the  end  of  the  world.  In  them  hath 
he  set  a  tabernacle  for  the  sun,  which  is  as  a  bridegroom  coming  out  of  his 
chamber,  and  rejoiceth  as  a  strong  man  to  run  a  race.  His  going  forth  is  from 
the  end  of  the  heaven,  and  his  circuit  unto  the  ends  of  it :  and  there  is  nothing 
hid  from  the  heat  thereof.'  The  second  passage  is  Job  38.  31,  where  is  mentioned 
'the  sweet  influence  of  the  Pleiades.'  The  resemblance  of  the  dance  of  the 
Pleiades  to  the  dance  of  seven  figures,  who  may  represent  Pleiades,  in  Guido's 
picture  of  Aurora,  has  been  remarked  by  Todd.  Apparently  this  is  the  only 
classical  antecedent  of  these  lines. 


214  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

composed  almost  entirely  of  mythology.    It  occurs  at  the  opening  of 
the  Sixth  Book  of  Paradise  Lost: 

All  night  the  dreadless  Angel,  unpursued, 

Though  Heaven's  wide  champaign  held  his  way,  till  Morn, 

Waked  by  the  circling  Hours,  with  rosy  hand 

Unbarred  the  gates  of  Light.    There  is  a  cave 

Within  the  Mount  of  God,  fast  by  his  throne, 

Where  Light  and  Darkness  in  perpetual  round 

Lodge  and  dislodge  by  turns,  which  makes  through  Heaven 

Grateful  vicissitude,  like  day  and  night; 

Light  issues  forth,  and  at  the  other  door 

Obsequious  Darkness  enters,  till  her  hour 

To  veil  the  Heaven,  though  darkness  there  might  well 

Seem  twilight  here.    And  now  went  forth  the  Morn, 

Such  as  in  highest  Heaven,  arrayed  in  gold 

Empyreal;  from  before  her  vanished  Night, 

Shot  through  with  orient  beams. 

In  this  passage  there  is  an  almost  literal  adaptation  of  at  least 
four  classical  poets  or  poetic  conceptions.  The  general  idea  of 
Dawn 's  opening  the  gates  is  from  Ovid ;  the  action  of  the  Hours  is 
from  Homer;  the  cave  of  Light  and  Darkness  is  Hesiod's  house  of 
Day  and  Night;  the  final  rout  of  Night  before  the  beams  of  the 
sun  is  a  common  conception  in  Greek  poetry,  though  perhaps  in  this 
case  referable  to  Dante. 

We  may  notice  that  in  this  passage  Milton  intends  to  describe,  not 
the  earthly  dawn,  but  the  grateful  vicissitude  of  light  and  darkness 
in  heaven.  There  is,  however,  in  his  description  a  beautiful  reflec- 
tion of  the  dayspring  as  it  has  appeared  to  many  men,  and  this 
reveals  to  us  a  most  important  quality  in  Milton's  treatment  of 
mythology  and  nature.  He  appreciates  the  values  of  two  things, 
nature  and  the  myth,  but  to  him  the  value  of  nature  outweighs 
that  of  the  myth.  This  accounts  for  the  vividness  and  reality  and 
enthusiasm,  which,  if  the  proportion  of  values  were  reversed,  would 
tend  to  become  pedantry  and  dry  conventionality.  With  a  view  to 
this  statement,  let  us  take  the  first  lines  of  the  preceding  passage : 

Morn, 
Waked  by  the  circling  Hours,  with  rosy  hand 
Unbarred  the  gates  of  Light. 

Let  us  analyze  this  passage  in  comparison  with  its  originals.    As 
already  suggested,  there  are  two  passages  in  the  classics  which  are 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       215 

here  represented.  The  first  is  in  the  Fifth  Book  of  the  Iliad,  where 
Hera  drives  forth  her  chariot  from  Olympus :  '  Self -moving  groaned 
upon  their  hinges  the,  gates  of  Heaven,  whereof  the  Hours  are 
warders,  to  whom  is  committed  great  Heaven  and  Olympus,  whether 
to  throw  open  the  thick  cloud  or  set  it  to.'36  The  other  passage  is 
in  the  Second  Book  of  Ovid's  Metamorphoses: 

Ecce  vigil  rutilo  patefecit  ab  ortu 
Purpureas  Aurora  fores  et  plena  rosarum 
Atria.37 

We  may  first  inquire  what  help  Ovid  has  given  Milton.  He 
suggests  the  idea  that  the  Dawn  at  her  rising  throws  open  certain 
gates,  but  further  than  this  his  influence  can  hardly  be  said  to 
extend.  As  usual  he  has  made  a  tableau,  overloading  it  with  gay 
color.  Milton,  however,  in  speaking  of  Aurora's  rosy  hand,  lends 
color  enough,  and  stops  before  he  smears.  He  is  speaking  of  dawn 
in  Heaven,  and  the  thought  of  gates  naturally  leads  him  to  think 
of  the  Hours,  who  are  the  warders  of  Heaven's  gates.  They  are 
therefore  adapted  from  Homer,  with  the  addition  of  a  beautiful 
epithet,  'circling,'  from  the  common  tradition  of  Greek  poetry. 
But  the  mere  juxtaposition  of  these  things  is  not  enough.  Milton, 
like  a  true  artist,  realizes  that  though  color  is  lovely,  something 
else  is  still  lovelier,  more  important,  and  more  vital.  He  loves  the 
morning  for  its  freshness,  its  action,  its  grace,  its  dignity,  its  pro- 
gress toward  glorious  climax,  and  all  these  qualities  are  present  in 
his  description.  There  is  action  in  the  words  '  waked '  and  '  circling ' 
and  'unbarred,'  and  in  the  intervening  or  accompanying  movement 
which  they  suggest.  There  is  freshness  and  grace  in  the  swift 
Hours,  in  the  modest  but  effective  touch  of  color,  and  in  the  fact 
that  we  do  not  hear  the  harsh  groan  of  the  gates  upon  their  hinges. 
There  is  dignity,  because  the  movement,  though  rapid,  is  not  hur- 
ried, and  stays  slightly  at  the  words  'with  rosy  hand.'  Lastly, 
there  is  progress  toward  a  climax.  Morn  is  waked  by  the  Hours; 
she  rises,  throws  back  the  bolt ;  the  gates  swing  open  without  effort, 
and  Light  leaps  forth  and  overspreads  the  sky.  This  action  is  sug- 
gested, if  not  expressed,  and  to  feel  the  full  effect  of  progress  and 
climax  the  passage  should  be  read  aloud  slowly  with  perfect  enun- 
ciation. Much  of  its  movement  and  progress  is  expressed  in  the 
effect  of  light  consonants  and  liquids,  and  in  the  fine  succession  of 

3«  Iliad  5.  749-751. 

87  Metamorphoses  2.112-114.  'Lo,  the  watchful  Aurora  opened  her  purple 
doors  in  the  ruddy  east,  and  her  halls  filled  with  roses.' 


216  CHARLES  GROSVENOR  OSGOOD 

vowels  which  seems  to  accompany  the  meaning  and  open  out  at  the 
end. 

It  would  be  a  mistake  to  assume  that  Milton  deliberately  and 
consciously  went  about  arranging  his  description  in  this  way.  He 
rather  felt  deeply  and  keenly  the  glories  of  a  new  day  at  first  hand, 
so  deeply  and  keenly  that  his  poetic  sense  of  these  things  rushes 
in  and  informs  his  description,  with  a  result  such  as  this  before 
us.  Thus  the  myth  does  not  remain  or  become,  in  his  hands,  a  life- 
less convention ;  nor  is  it  a  sort  of  mythological  veil,  through  which 
we  faintly  see  the  loveliness  of  nature.  Rather,  on  the  one  hand, 
he  understands  the  spirit  of  nature,  and  is  in  harmony  with  it; 
on  the  other,  he  has  sympathized  with  the  Greek  imagination 
until  he  imagines  in  part  as  a  Greek.  When,  therefore,  he  hears 
from  the  Greek  lyre,  though  echoed  never  so  faintly,  a  note  first 
stirred  by  the  great  harp  of  nature,  he  recognizes  it,  and  sounds  it 
again,  loud  and  clear,  inseparably  mingling  the  qualities  of  the 
two  instruments  in  one  tone. 

It  follows  from  this  as  a  sort  of  converse  statement  that  Milton 
was  also  independent  in  his  use  of  the  myth.  It  never  threatens  to 
get  the  better  of  him,  for  his  use  of  it  is  governed  by  an  unfailing 
sense  of  things  more  serious  and  important  to  the  human  heart  and 
mind.  However  extensive  the  mythological  element  in  a  given 
passage,  the  result  is  no  less  vivid  and  imaginative.  The  myth 
never  encumbers  the  poet  and  gets  in  his  way.  It  does  not  have 
the  appearance  of  something  in  the  wrong  place,  which  makes  itself 
the  excuse  for  being  there.  Rather  it  is  properly  related  to  the  more 
important  thing,  and  falls  into  the  place  where  it  belongs. 

After  this  somewhat  detailed  analysis  and  consideration  of  the 
more  apparent  facts  in  connection  with  Milton's  treatment  of 
nature,  let  us  endeavor  to  weigh  the  value  of  the  mythological  ele- 
ment in  Milton 's  art,  and  discover,  if  possible,  the  true  benefit  of  its 
influence  upon  him. 

As  we  have  already  seen,  mythology  is  not  the  product  of  one 
man,  possessing  the  marks  of  his  peculiarities,  but  is  the  reflection 
of  national  character  and  ideas.  It  is  only  in  part  subject  to  the 
personal  variation  of  the  individual  who  treats  it.  Its  nature  is 
therefore  chiefly  universal,  containing  qualities  and  truths  which 
appeal,  not  to  men  of  a  certain  narrow  class,  but  to  nearly  all  men. 
For  this  reason  classical  myths,  when  presented  in  an  artistic  and 
appreciative  manner,  exert  a  strong  and  refining  influence,  and 
many  have  therefore  insisted  upon  a  study  of  them  as  an  element 
in  the  best  culture;  for  culture  is  not  an  exaggeration  and  devel- 


MILTON'S  USE  OF  CLASSICAL  MYTHOLOGY       217 

opment  of  the  oddities  and  idiosyncrasies  of  the  individual,  but  is 
rather  the  result  of  assimilating  in  one  soul,  so  far  as  may  be,  the 
best  part  of  the  past  and  contemporary  life  of  men,  that  is,  the  part 
which  is  most  permanent  and  universal.  It  is  according  to  such 
a  principle  that  mythology  possesses  artistic  value.  The  best  and 
most  permanent  qualities  of  the  Greek  people  are  to  be  found 
there ;  and  the  artist  who  selects  his  material  from  it,  and  who  treats 
it  lovingly  and  with  understanding,  may  be  sure  of  a  certain  steadi- 
ness and  universality  in  his  art,  while  at  the  same  time  the  mate- 
rial is  of  such  a  pliant  nature  that  he  may  express  with  it  much 
of  the  best  that  he  has  within  himself.  Take,  for  example,  the 
passage  which  we  have  already  discussed: 

Morn, 
"Waked  by  the  circling  Hours,  with  rosy  hand 
Unbarred  the  gates  of  Light. 

We  have  seen  already  the  extent  and  importance  of  the  classical 
element  in  this  passage.  The  pure  and  beautiful  imagery  is  wholly 
classical.  It  possesses  Greek  dignity  and  repose.  It  contains  the 
elements  of  expectancy,  action,  progress,  and  climax,  and  these 
qualities  are  the  essential  and  universal  ones  by  which  the  beauty 
of  the  dawn  appeals  to  men.  But  thoroughly  mingled  with  the 
universal  elements  of  these  lines  are  some  of  the  best  personal 
qualities  of  Milton  himself.  They  are  not  introduced  in  the  form 
of  a  curious  and  outlandish  conceit;  by  his  selection  of  certain 
qualities  from  the  Greek,  and  his  emphasis  of  them,  he  reflects  the 
same  qualities  in  his  own  nature.  Such  are  his  delicacy,  dignity, 
and  repose.  Then  we  feel  also  his  purity  of  thought  and  emotion, 
and  his  high  reserve,  which  is  felt  elsewhere,  in  nearly  every  line,  as 
a  distinguishing  trait  of  the  poet. 

Milton  lived  in  a  time  when  the  importance  and  development  of 
individuality  had  become  the  importance  and  development  of  per- 
sonal peculiarity.  Much  of  the  poetry  of  his  time  suffered  from 
this  fact,  and  as  a  result  is  full  of  conceits  and  curious  figures, 
while  generally  it  no  longer  appeals  strongly  to  men,  and  is  now 
read  only  at  the  promptings  of  an  idle  interest  in  its  quaintness. 
Milton  himself  did  not  always  escape  this  tendency  to  conceit  and 
oddity.  Whether  he  was  aware  of  it  or  not,  the  fact  remains  that 
mythology  often  served  in  his  case  as  a  sort  of  safeguard  against 
such  mistakes,  for  while  it  suffered  some  modification  under  the 
influence  of  his  individuality,  it  kept  his  poetry  within  the  bounds 
of  universal  appeal. 


XVI 

THE  GREEK  GIFT  TO  CIVILIZATION  1 

By  Samuel  Lee  Wolff 

The  Greeks  meant  one  thing  to  men  of  the  early  Renaissance, 
another  thing  to  Pope  and  Addison,  another  thing  to  Germans  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  Every  generation  has  taken  its  Greek  in 
its  own  way.  And  the  present  generation,  heir  of  all  the  ages,  is 
taking  its  Greek  in  nearly  every  way — except  one.  It  is  not  taking 
its  Greek  for  granted.  An  expositor  of  Hellenism  to-day  is  almost 
obliged  to  become  an  apologist.  He  must  'show  us.'  Even  as 
seasoned  a  Grecian  as  Professor  Mahaffy,  who  surely  is  entitled, 
if  any  one  is,  to  be  at  his  ease  in  Hellas,  does  not  resist  this  com- 
pulsion. The  quiet  and  still  air  of  his  delightful  studies  is  stirred 
with  argument,  about  Greek  in  the  college  curriculum,  about  the 
neglect  of  Aristotelian  logic  by  American  youth,  about,  on  the  one 
hand,  Greek  versus  'Science,'  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  truly 
'scientific'  temper  of  Greek  thought.  Throughout  he  seems  to  feel 
that  the  Greeks  need  to  be  vindicated;  and  their  vindication, 
throughout,  is  that  they  are  'modern.' 

This  seems  to  mean  that  they  are  free  from  mysticism  and 
obscurantism,  those  sins  of  the  Middle  Ages ;  and  Professor  Mahaffy 
is  the  more  inclined  to  praise  Greek  clear-sightedness  in  virtue  of 
his  own  long-standing  feud  with  mediaevalism.  There  is  a  fine 
old-fashioned  flavor,  as  of  some  clergyman  in  Thomas  Love  Pea- 
cock— a  Ffolliott,  a  Portpipe,  an  Opimian — in  the  valiant  no- 
Popery  flings  of  our  author  against  the  Church  and  against  the 
theological  prepossessions  of  mediaeval  science  and  philosophy. 
The  modern  contentiousness  about  Greek  here  receives  a  tempera- 
mental reinforcement. 

[i  This  article,  of  which  four-fifths  are  now  reprinted,  first  appeared  in  the 
Nation  (New  York)  for  April  7,  1910,  as  a  review  of  Mahaffy 's  What  Have 
the  Greeks  Done  for  Modern  Civilisation?  Section  IV,  dealing  with  the  plan 
and  scope  of  the  particular  book  rather  than  the  subject,  has  been  omitted. 
The  parts  included  are  published  with  the  consent  of  Dr.  Wolff  and  the  editor 
of  the  Nation. — Editor.] 


THE  GREEK  GIFT  TO  CIVILIZATION  219 

All  good  things  being  Greek,  and  all  bad  things  non-Greek,  the 
Middle  Ages  were  non-Greek;  and  the  Renaissance,  which  put  an 
end  to  them,  was  Greek.  Such  seems  to  be  the  latent  reasoning  at 
the  bottom  of  Professor  Mahaffy  's  view — and  we  admit  it  to  be  the 
popular  view — that  by  means  of  a  resurgence  of  Greek  art,  litera- 
ture, and  philosophy,  the  Renaissance  superseded  the  Middle  Ages, 
and  that  the  Renaissance  was  in  spirit  and  accomplishment  truly 
Greek,  truly  classical.  The  naive  assumption  of  the  humanists 
that  they  had  emerged  from  a  'thick  Gothic  night,'  Professor 
Mahaffy  would  modify  by  substituting  'Latin'  for  'Gothic';  and, 
having  thus  given  a  bad  name  to  the  Scholastic  Philosophy,  to 
Romanesque  and  Gothic  architecture,  to  the  Dies  Irae  and  to  the 
chansons  de  geste,  he  would  contentedly  hang  them  all.  Now,  he 
believes,  upon  the  thick  Latin  night  up  rose  Greek,  and  up  rose  the 
sun:  the  classical  Renaissance  and  the  'modern  spirit'  were  a  twin 
birth  of  the  revival  of  Greek  studies.2  This  view  seems  to  us 
erroneous;  and,  as  the  conceptions  underlying  it  determine  Pro- 
fessor Mahaffy 's  treatment  of  his  subject,  we  shall  examine  it  at 
some  length.  Waiving  all  questions  of  chronology,  disregarding 
therefore  all  mediaeval  anticipations  of  the  Renaissance  or  of  the 
'modern  spirit,'  granting  that  the  light  did  not  dawn  till  Greek 
began  to  reappear,  and  then  dawned  decisively,  we  believe  it  would 
not  be  difficult  to  show  that  the  Renaissance  itself  was  not  essen- 
tially Hellenic. 

The  literature  of  the  Renaissance,  both  in  and  out  of  Italy,  is 
four-fifths  of  it  Latinistic — Virgilian,  Ciceronian,  Senecan,  occa- 
sionally Horatian,  very  heavily  Ovidian.  It  springs  not  imme- 
diately, often  not  mediately,  from  Homer,  Demosthenes,  Pindar, 
Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  or  even  Euripides.  The  other  fifth,  which 
does  draw  nourishment  from  Greek  literature,  draws  it  from  the 
Greek  literature,  not  of  the  golden,  but  of  the  silver  and  the  pinch- 
beck ages.  Boccaccio,  Professor  Mahaffy  points  out,3  is  indebted 
to  Greek  prose  fiction ;  but  what  he  does  not  point  out  is  that  Boc- 
caccio 's  debt  runs  mostly  to  very  late  Byzantine  romances  now 
lost.  Lyly  draws  from  Plutarch  On  Education.  Sannazaro  breaks 
from  the  Virgilian  pastoral  tradition  to  return  to  Theocritus. 
Tasso's  Aminta,  as  is  well  known,  gets  what  is  probably  its  most 
famous  passage  from  the  late  prose  romance  of  Achilles  Tatius. 
As  is  not  so  well  known,  the  Jerusalem  Delivered,  too,  professedly 

2  Mahaffy,  pp.  18,  19. 
s  Ibid.,  p.  95  n. 


220  SAMUEL  LEE  WOLFF 

a  restoration  of  the  classical — that  is,  the  Virgilian — epic,  in  repro- 
bation of  the  composite  romance-epic  of  Pulci,  Boiardo,  and 
Ariosto,  is  itself  full  of  the  conceits  of  late  Greek  rhetoric.  The 
Pastor  Fido  is  based  upon  a  story  in  Pausanias.  It  seems  well 
within  the  truth  to  say  that  where  Renaissance  literature  is  Greek 
at  all,  it  is  almost  certain  to  be  in  the  Alexandrianized,  Romanized, 
Byzantinized,  and  Orientalized  vein  that  we  call  Greek  only  because 
we  have  no  better  name  for  it. 

The  art  and  the  philosophy  of  the  Renaissance,  like  its  literature, 
do  not  draw  from  pure  Hellenic  fountains.  Botticelli,  Raphael,  and 
Titian  are  not  inspired  by  Greek  statuary  of  the  best  period,  very 
little  of  which  had  been  unearthed;  Greek  painting  was  probably 
unknown  to  them,  and,  at  any  rate,  Greek  painting,  as  far  as  it  has 
survived  at  all,  is  of  the  Campanian,  the  Alexandrian  style — dis- 
tinctly post-classical.  The  putti  of  the  Renaissance  may,  indeed, 
it  is  thought,  be  traced  to  the  'Egyptian  plague  of  Loves' — those 
Cupids,  which,  whether  attendant  upon  the  amorous  adventures  of 
the  gods,  or  nesting  in  trees,  or  wreathing  garlands,  or  exposed  in 
cages  for  sale,  '  flutter  through  the  Pompeian  pictures. '  And  where 
the  great  painters  of  the  Renaissance  thought  of  themselves  as  illus- 
trators of  'literary'  themes  (we  are  just  rediscovering  how  decid- 
edly they  did  so  think  of  themselves — to  the  confusion  of  'art  for 
art's  sake'),  they  looked  for  their  themes,  not  in  Homer,  or  the  trage- 
dians, or  the  myths  of  Plato,  but  in  Ovid,  or  Apuleius,  or  Philos- 
tratus,  or  Lucian.  Raphael's  frescoes  in  the  Farnesina  got  their 
Olympians,  not  from  Hesiod,  but  from  Apuleius.  Botticelli's 
Calunnia,  as  Professor  Mahaffy  mentions  elsewhere,  is  derived  from 
Lucian 's  description  of  the  Diabole  of  Apelles.  Mantegna,  Titian, 
Raphael,  Giulio  Romano,  and  others  deliberately  retranslated  into 
color  and  visual  form  the  verbal  descriptions  by  Philostratus  of 
paintings  in  a  supposed  picture-gallery. 

As  for  the  Platonism  of  the  Renaissance,  that  too  was  composite, 
with  its  leaning  toward  pseudo-Dionysian  hierarchies  and  toward 
elaborate  theories  of  love.  It  was  the  Platonism  of  Plotinus,  rather, 
after  the  sehool  of  Alexandria ;  for,  in  spite  of  Ficino  's  translation, 
the  Platonism  of  Athens  was  to  them  unknown — or,  when  known, 
too  purely  Attic  to  be  assimilated.  There  was,  indeed,  an  echo  of 
pre-Socratic  Greek  thought  in  the  animistic  philosophies  of  South- 
ern Italy;  but  these  Professor  Mahaffy  does  not  mention,  despite 
their  influence  upon  Bacon  by  way  of  Telesio  and  Campanella. 

In  general,  Renaissance  taste  is  distinctly  unclassical.  It  runs  to 
digression  and  irrelevancy;  to  inserted  descriptions  and  episodes; 


THE  GREEK  GIFT  TO  CIVILIZATION  221 

to  huge  verbosity.  It  revels  in  the  'word-paintings'  (cK<^pao-«s) 
which  were  a  specialty  of  the  late  sophists  and  rhetoricians ;  it  never 
tires  of  their  speechmaking.  It  favors  whole  bookfuls  of  orations 
invented  as  patterns  of  the  kind  of  thing  that  might  be  said  upon 
a  given  occasion  by  persons  imaginary,  mythological,  or  historical. 
These  ^0o7roieZcu  and  /leAercu  bulk  large  in  the  Anthology,  and  re- 
appear in  collections  like  'Silvayn's'  Orator — to  mention,  perhaps, 
the  most  familiar  name  among  many.  The  prose  of  the  Renaissance, 
again,  like  late  Greek  prose,  tends,  without  resistance,  to  the  most 
exaggerated  conceits  and  antitheses,  each  country  in  Europe  devel- 
oping its  own  particular  brands  of  bad  taste — Euphuism,  Gongor- 
ism,  Marinism,  and  the  rest — upon  a  common  basis  of  Ciceronian 
and  late  Greek  rhetoric.  In  imitation,  too,  of  the  tours  de  force  of 
degenerate  Greek  and  Roman  rhetoricians,  the  versifiers  of  the 
Renaissance  often  chose  the  most  trivial  themes,  and  embellished 
them  with  all  the  graces  of  double  entendre.  To  match  the  antique 
disquisitions  '  Of  Long  Hair, '  and  '  In  Praise  of  Baldness, '  we  have 
the  capitoli  of  Berni  and  his  school  on  '  Figs, '  '  Beans, '  '  Sausages, ' 
'Bakers'  Ovens,'  'Hard-Boiled  Eggs,'  'Chestnuts,'  'Paint-Brushes,' 
'Bells,'  'Needles,'  'Going  without  Hats,'  and  'Lying  late  Abed.' 
It  is  a  far  cry  from  this  sort  of  thing  to  Homer  or  to  the  Periclean 
age.  Indeed,  if  by  Greek  we  mean  '  classic, '  the  Renaissance  was  not 
Greek.  Not  until  the  late  eighteenth  century,  after  the  way  had 
been  cleared  by  those  'pedants,'  German  and  other,  to  whom  this 
work  alludes  so  slightingly,  was  the  true  Renaissance  of  classic 
Greek  accomplished;  only  then  may  the  modern  world  be  said  to 
have  entered  fully  upon  its  Greek  heritage.  What  the  Renaissance 
of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  achieved  was  rather  a  pan- 
Latinistic  revival,  which  attended  especially  to  the  process  of  re- 
casting and  enriching  the  vernacular  tongues,  mostly  by  means  of 
Latin  or  post-classical  Greek  models,  into  vehicles  of  a  modern 
eloquentia  that  might  rival  the  antique.  Its  degenerate  models, 
together  with  its  own  taste  in  choosing  them,  made  it,  not  pure, 
reposeful,  imaginative,  but  composite,  unquiet,  fantastic,  rhetorical, 
loquacious — all  that  is  suggested  when  we  say  'Alexandrian.' 

One  cannot  help  feeling  that  Professor  Mahaffy's  taste  in  these 
matters  has  been  'subdued  to  what  it  works  in'  by  his  extensive 
studies  of  post-classical  Greek.  This  bias  appears  in  the  estimate 
of  Aristotle's  Poetics  and  the  dicta  about  Wordsworth,  Tennyson, 
and  others.  The  Poetics  is  treated  as  if  it  were  merely  a  collection 
of  judgments  upon  individual  works  in  Greek  literature:  if  these 
judgments  are  erroneous,  the  work  is  a  failure,  of  course.    It  is  not 


222  SAMUEL  LEE  WOLFF 

perceived,  apparently,  that  the  Poetics  is  an  exposition  of  basic 
principles,  the  principles  of  poetry  and  of  art  in  general ;  and  that, 
in  its  justification  of  poetry  as  an  imaginative  embodiment  of  the 
universal  (a  view  which  Plato,  for  all  his  poetry,  completely 
missed),  and  in  its  promulgation  of  the  law  of  unity,  it  laid  sure 
foundations  for  the  criticism  of  all  time,  and  established  an  un- 
assailable canon  of  classic  or  ideal  art.  All  this  apart  from  the 
historical  importance  of  the  Poetics  misunderstood — apart  from 
the  pseudo-classic  of  the  sixteenth,  seventeenth,  and  eighteenth 
centuries,  apart  from  the  controversies  about  '  imitation, '  catharsis, 
and  the  'three  unities.'  Of  this  really  fundamental  book  Professor 
Mahaffy  says:*  'I  know  of  no  poorer  and  more  jejune  exposition 
of  a  great  subject';  and  on  the  next  page  he  cavalierly  dismisses 
it  upon  the  plea  of  lack  of  time.  The  same  want  of  appreciation  of 
the  universal  in  Hellenism  is  responsible  for  some  of  the  opinions 
here  expressed  upon  the  Greek  in  modern  English  poetry.  Of  the 
'galaxy  that  illumined  the  early  nineteenth  century,'  Wordsworth 
is  considered  to  be  'the  least  Greek'  ;B  and  this  because  of  his  failure 
to  distinguish  prose  diction  from  poetical,  and  because  of  the 
inordinate  length  of  the  Excursion.  Keats,  however,  had  caught 
the  Greek  spirit,  though  at  seeond  or  third  hand;8  in  Shelley,  'we 
have  that  perfect  combination  of  romantic  imagination  with  Greek 
culture '  which  makes  him  the  greatest  of  this  group  ;7  and  Tenny- 
son is  'the  most  classical  of  our  modern  lyric  poets.'8 

Read  in  view  of  the  critic's  Alexandrian  bias  and  of  the  quota- 
tions which  illustrate  his  criticism,  these  dicta  become  plain.  Keats 
is  Greek  in  being  a  master  of  isolated  sensuous  images,  chaste  or 
voluptuous — not  in  virtue  of  his  delicacy  in  selection  or  his  passion 
for  beauty;  certainly  not  in  virtue  of  that  architectonic  which  he 
never  possessed.  Shelley's  'clouds  and  sunsets'  and  spirits  and 
flower-bells  and  pavilions — the  imagery  of  romanticism — are  at 
the  service  of  his  revolt  and  of  his  love  of  Greece  and  liberty.  What 
matter  that  Shelley  hardly  touched  human  experience,  hardly 
touched  the  general  life  of  man  ?  The  case  is  still  clearer  when  we 
come  to  Wordsworth  and  Tennyson.  Of  Wordsworth's  purity  and 
wisdom — of  his  universality,  and  of  his  'plain  and  noble'  style — 
of  all  that  makes  him  a  true  classic,  a  true  Greek  despite  his  re- 

*  Mahaffy,  p.  62. 
b  Ibid.,  pp.  56-57. 
« Ibid.,  p.  46. 
»  Ibid.,  p.  56. 
» Ibid.,  p.  59. 


THE  GREEK  GIFT  TO  CIVILIZATION  223 

current  prosiness — there  is  not  a  word ;  though,  of  course,  the  spe- 
cific Platonism  in  "Wordsworth's  wonderful  Ode  is  recognized.  But 
what  of  Laodamia? — 

for  the  gods  approve 
The  depth,  and  not  the  tumult,  of  the  soul. 

What  of  Dion  ?— 

So  were  the  hopeless  troubles,  that  involved 
The  soul  of  Dion,  instantly  dissolved. 

Him,  only  him,  the  shield  of  Jove  defends, 
Whose  means  are  fair  and  spotless  as  his  ends. 

Or — to  take  Wordsworth  not  on  classical  ground,  and  in  a  vein  not 
sententious — what  can  be  more  Greek  than  those  autochthonous 
figures  of  the  Leech-Gatherer,  and  of  Michael  at  the  unfinished 
sheepf  old  ? — 

.  .  .  'Tis  believed  by  all 

That  many  and  many  a  day  he  thither  went, 

And  never  lifted  up  a  single  stone ; 

or  this  about  Michael's  wife? — 

Whose  heart  was  in  her  house :  two  wheels  she  had 
Of  antique  form,  this  large  for  spinning  wool, 
That  small  for  flax;  and  if  one  wheel  had  rest, 
It  was  because  the  other  was  at  work ; — 

lines  of  which  Homer  would  not  need  to  be  ashamed.  One  might 
as  well  say  that  Millet's  Sower  is  not  Greek,  or  that  Lincoln's 
speech  at  Gettysburg  is  not  Greek — Greek  as  Simonides!  Finally, 
the  Hellenism  of  Tennyson  is  here  supposed  to  be  shown  by  the 
Lotos-Eaters  and  the  Theocritean  'Come  down,  O  maid,'  and  that 
well-nigh  intolerable  piece  of  oxymoron  and  antithesis : 

His  honor  rooted  in  dishonor  stood, 

And  faith  unfaithful  kept  him  falsely  true. 

So  much  of  Tennyson's  work  is  Greek  in  a  very  pure  sense  that 
it  seems  a  pity  to  try  to  prove  him  Hellenic  by  what  at  best  can 
prove  him  only  Alexandrian.  .  .  . 

The  Greeks,  more  than  all  other  peoples  before  or  since,  believed 


224  SAMUEL  LEE  WOLFF 

in  the  power  of  mind,  and  practised  their  belief.  Applying  mind 
to  the  raw  material  of  sensation,  they  turned  experience  into  wis- 
dom, fact  into  truth,  the  Many  into  the  One,  chaos  into  law,  the 
particular  and  provincial  into  the  ideal  and  the  universal.  But 
they  were  not  content  to  rest  in  this  supersensible  region:  they 
re-embodied  their  ideals  in  noble  sensuous  and  intellectual  forms, 
which  they  chose  from  amid  a  welter  of  forms  possible  but  ignoble 
or  insignificant,  and  which  therefore  have  appealed  to  mankind 
semper,  ubique.  So  that,  whether  in  the  subtle  curves  of  a  build- 
ing, or  in  the  proportions  of  a  statue,  or  in  the  shape  of  a  vase,  or 
in  the  notes  of  the  musical  scale,  or  in  finding  how  the  human  mind, 
out  of  an  infinite  number  of  ways  in  which  it  can  work,  actually 
does  work  towards  truth;  whether  in  art,  or  letters,  or  logic,  or 
science,  or  a  hundred  other  departments  of  human  activity,  we 
still  perceive  that  they  have  performed  for  mankind,  once  for  all, 
the  labor  of  selection.  It  is  impossible  to  overestimate  this  accom- 
plishment in  the  racial  economy,  just  as  it  is  impossible  to  over- 
estimate the  specific  nobility  and  loftiness  of  the  ideal  heritage  they 
have  left  to  the  race. 

Those  who  follow  the  Greek  ways,  and,  without  limiting  them- 
selves to  old  experience,  fearlessly,  and  with  confidence  in  the  power 
of  mind,  push  into  the  new  data  of  modern  life  along  the  path  that 
has  proved  possible — these  are  the  pioneers;  these  are  subduing 
chaos  and  bringing  it  province  by  province  under  the  rule  of  spirit. 
Those  who,  refusing  to  profit  by  the  Greek  economy,  try  old  fail- 
ures again  in  ignorance  or  from  choice,  throw  away  their  heritage. 
It  is  only  by  accident  that  they  may  happen  upon  some  worthy 
thing.  Their  aberration,  generally  speaking,  takes  either  or  both 
of  two  forms,  according  as  they  fail  to  value  one  or  another  phase  of 
the  Greek  accomplishment.  Either  they  deny  the  validity  of  the 
results  achieved  by  selection,  and  still  fancy  that  'the  world  is  all 
before  them  where  to  choose';  or  they  deny  the  right  of  mind  to 
work  selectively  at  all  upon  the  data  of  experience,  insist  that  all 
things  are  of  equal  value  except  as  weeded  out  by  natural  selection, 
and  enslave  themselves  to  the  crude  fact.  The  first  error  is  the 
error  of  modern  art,  the  second  that  of  modern  politics — at  least, 
so  far  as  both  have  been  evolved  under  democratic  institutions. 
The  art  of  democracy  is  supposed  to  demand  that  no  forms  be 
rejected  as  ignoble.  The  politics  of  democracy,  theoretically  allow- 
ing free  play  to  the  conflicting  wills  of  individuals,  each  striving 
for  the  ends  indicated  by  his  '  enlightened  self-interest, '  fails  to  pro- 
vide for  right  leadership,  for  a  chosen  mind  to  control  the  welter, 


THE  GREEK  GIFT  TO  CIVILIZATION  225 

and  so  falls  into  the  gripe  of  wrong  leadership — for  a  mind  of  some 
sort  is  sure  to  gain  control,  soon  or  late.  Modern  science  has  escaped 
the  second  error,  by  selecting  from  the  method  of  Bacon  that  part 
which  is  Greek  in  spirit.  The  Baconian  induction,  just  in  so  far 
as  it  enslaved  itself  to  fact,  and  disallowed  hypothesis,  and  denied 
the  rights  of  mind — just  in  so  far  as  it  was  un-Greek — was  a 
failure;  and  just  in  so  far  as  it  'married  mind  with  matter' — to 
use  Bacon's  own  similitude — was,  and  is,  a  success.  We  are  not  to 
be,  says  Bacon  again,  like  the  ant,  which  gathers  and  stores  up  her 
hoard  untransformed  by  aught  that  she  does;  nor  yet  like  the 
spider,  which  spins  her  subtle  thread  all  from  within;  but  rather 
like  the  bee,  which  both  gathers  from  without  and  transforms  from 
within  that  which  she  gathers.  Only  thus  shall  we  get  'sweetness 
and  light.' 

The  Hellenist  still  believes  that,  things  being  given,  ideas  shall 
prevail.  And  so,  instead  of  fighting  things  out,  or  letting  the  stress 
of  competing  forces  among  things  work  out  its  wasteful  end,  as 
nature  does,  at  dreadful  expense  of  pain,  at  dire  expense  of  spirit 
and  of  life,  he  endeavors  to  think  things  out.  He  may,  by  inter- 
national arbitration,  substitute  the  sanction  of  ideas  for  the  sanction 
of  arms.  Or,  upon  a  broad  basis  of  facts,  he  may  build  a  luminous 
hypothesis  or  rise  to  a  law.  He  may  be  designing  a  subway  or  a  city, 
and  planning  it  so  that  the  work  will  not  have  to  be  done  over  after 
the  lapse  of  years.  He  may  raise  wages  or  share  his  profits,  not 
under  the  compulsion  of  a  strike,  but  again  under  the  compulsion  of 
an  idea — his  own  idea  of  equitable  distribution.  In  many  ways  his 
mind,  dealing  with  fact,  will  draw  wisdom  out  of  life ;  in  many  ways 
he  will  re-embody  that  wisdom  in  chosen  forms  of  beauty,  and  with 
whatever  materials  life  gives  him  will  make  of  himself  a  poet,  and  of 
life  an  art.  We  leave  the  subject  with  a  question  for  those  of  an 
inquiring  mind:  Is  our  'modern'  way  of  life  favorable  to  tempers 
of  this  kind?  Do  we  believe  in  the  supremacy  of  spirit?  And 
would  it  have  been  a  merit  in  the  Greeks  had  they  been  like  us  ? 


XVII 

OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  x 

By  Thaddaeus  Zieunski 

The  task  before  me  is  to  interpret  to  my  hearers,  as  far  as  the 
time  at  our  disposal  and  my  powers  permit,  the  importance  of  the 
special  department  of  knowledge  of  which  I  am  the  accredited 
representative  at  the  St.  Petersburg  University — a  department 
which  I  may  briefly  indicate  by  the  title  '  Antiquity. '  Our  end  may 
be  gained  by  three  different  ways,  corresponding  to  the  threefold 
aspect  of  the  subject  itself.  Antiquity  forms,  in  the  first  place, 
the  subject-matter  of  that  science  which  is  commonly,  though  in 
some  respects  erroneously,  called  'classical  philology';  in  the  second 
place,  it  contributes  an  element  to  the  intellectual  and  moral  culture 
of  modern  European  society;  in  the  third  place — and  here  its  sig- 
nificance especially  touches  you,  my  hearers — it  forms  one  of  the 
subjects  taught  in  the  'privileged'  secondary  schools  of  Russia — the 
so-called  Classical  Gymnasia. 

Each  of  these  points  of  view  reveals  to  us  a  new  aspect  of 
antiquity;  each  compels  the  trained  scholar  to  range  himself  in 
direct  opposition  to  the  opinion  prevalent  to-day  among  the  edu- 
cated in  every  country,  and  particularly  in  Russia.  Men,  indeed, 
have  made  up  their  minds  that  what  is  called  'classical  philology' 
is  a  science  which,  however  zealously  cultivated,  yet  affords  no 
longer  any  interesting  problems  for  our  solution.  Our  expert, 
however,  will  tell  you  that  never  has  it  had  such  interest  for  us  as 
to-day;  that  the  entire  work  of  previous  generations  was  merely 
preparatory — in  fact,  was  merely  the  foundation  on  which  we  are 

[i  This  selection  consists  of  the  first  29  pages  of  the  first  lecture  (pp.  1-30) 
out  of  eight  in  Professor  Zielinski  's  Our  Debt  to  Antiquity,  translated  by  H.  A. 
Strong  and  Hugh  Stewart.  London,  1909.  The  lectures  were  delivered  in  the 
spring  of  the  year  1903  to  the  highest  classes  in  the  secondary  schools  of 
Petrograd,  and  were  immediately  published.  The  translators  made  use  of  the 
second  edition.  The  selection  is  here  reprinted  under  an  agreement  with  the 
publishers  of  the  translation,  Messrs.  George  Eoutledge  and  Sons,  Ltd., 
London. — Editor.  ] 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  227 

only  now  beginning  to  raise  the  actual  structure  of  our  knowledge ; 
that  problems  ever  new,  challenging  research  and  demanding  solu- 
tion, meet  us  at  every  step  in  the  field  of  our  progress. 

Again,  in  regard  to  the  element  contributed  by  antiquity  to  mod- 
ern culture,  a  belief  rules  abroad  that  antiquity  plays  a  meaningless 
part  in  the  world  of  to-day ;  that  it  has  no  significance  for  modern 
culture ;  and  that  it  has  long  since  been  superseded  by  the  achieve- 
ments of  modern  thought.  But  our  expert,  again,  will  assure  us 
that  our  modern  culture,  both  intellectual  and  moral,  has  never 
been  so  closely  bound  up  with  antiquity  as  to-day,  and  has  never 
stood  in  such  pressing  need  of  its  contributions.  He  will  tell  us, 
further,  that  we  have  never  been  so  well  equipped  for  understand- 
ing and  assimilating  it  as  to-day.  Finally,  in  regard  to  antiquity 
as  an  element  of  education,  people  are  disposed  to  deem  it  merely 
a  singular  survival,  which  has  maintained  its  footing  in  our  modern 
school  curriculum  in  some  unintelligible  way  and  for  some  unintel- 
ligible reason,  but  which  is  destined  to  make  a  speedy  and  final 
disappearance.  But  the  man  who  understands  the  true  position 
of  affairs  will  rejoin  that  antiquity,  from  its  very  nature  and 
essence,  owing  to  both  historical  and  psychological  causes,  is  and 
must  be  considered  an  organic  element  of  education  in  European 
schools,  and  that  if  it  be  destined  to  disappear  entirely,  its  end  will 
coincide  with  the  end  of  modern  European  culture. 

We  have,  then,  these  three  antitheses;  and  you  will  agree  that 
sharper  cannot  easily  be  formulated.  I  am  afraid  that  the  very 
statement  of  these  antitheses  may  trouble  you  and  dispose  you  to 
look  with  suspicion  on  what  I  have  to  say.  And  as  such  an  a  priori 
prejudice  may  conceivably  weaken  the  effect  of  the  lecturer's  words 
on  the  minds  of  his  audience,  pray  allow  me  to  dispel  it,  as  far  as 
prejudice  can  be  dispelled  by  the  operation  of  reason.  Indeed,  I 
can  imagine  your  objection  to  be  stated  thus  broadly: 

'  Does  not  the  mere  composition  of  the  two  parties  to  the  dispute 
show  who  is  right  and  who  is  wrong?  Is  it  possible  that  the  vast 
majority  of  men  should  be  wrong,  and  that  the  expert  of  whom 
you  speak,  and  with  whom  you  probably  identify  yourself,  Pro- 
fessor, should  be  right?  Let  us  leave  ''classical  philology"  out  of 
account  for  the  moment;  it  has  no  interest  for  the  world  at  large, 
so  the  world  at  large  has  the  right  to  ignore  it.  But  antiquity  as 
an  element  in  culture,  antiquity  as  a  vital  factor  in  education — can 
we  really  admit  that  men  have  gone  so  far  astray  in  settling  ques- 
tions which  touch  them  so  nearly  ?  Vox  populi,  vox  Dei,  is  no  mere 
idle  saying.' 


228  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

Here  I  could  make  a  reservation,  and  a  fairly  important  one, 
with  respect  to  this  majority  of  which  we  hear  so  much;  but  let 
that  pass.  Let  it  be  even  as  you  say.  Still,  I  cannot  admit  the 
applicability  of  the  proverb  about  the  vox  populi  to  this  majority, 
whether  it  be  found  to  exist  in  reality  or  in  imagination  only — the 
history  of  all  ages  protests  loudly  against  such  an  application. 
Only  reflect  how  Rome  drove  the  early  Christians  into  the  arena; 
think  how  Spain  raged  against  the  heretics,  or  Germany  against 
the  witches ;  think  of  the  unanimous  support  long  afforded  to  insti- 
tutions like  negro  slavery  in  America,  or  serfdom  in  Russia,  and 
you  will  agree  that  the  vox  populi  is  in  truth  only  too  often  the 
vox  Diaboli,  and  not  the  vox  Dei.  To-day  we  not  only  condemn 
such  manifestations  of  the  popular  will,  we  explain  them  dis- 
passionately; that  is  no  bad  thing.  We  show  the  reasons  which  in 
all  the  cases  I  have  indicated  have  forced  men  to  conclusions  so  ad- 
verse to  their  true  interests.  And  in  the  present  case  also  we  can 
adopt  the  same  attitude;  in  the  present  case  also  we  can  .  .  . 
analyze  the  cause  of  the  adverse  position  taken  up  by  modern  critics 
against  antiquity.  We  can  distinguish  the  part  played  therein  by 
well-intentioned  and  involuntary  delusion  from  that  which  we  must 
ascribe  to  intentional  deception.  For  the  moment  my  purpose  is 
different:  I  am  anxious  only  to  shatter  your  simple  faith — if  you 
have  a  faith — in  the  infallibility  of  public  opinion,  and  to  protest 
against  the  misapplication  of  the  proverb,  Vox  populi,  vox  Dei. 

The  proper  meaning  of  this  saying  I  will  proceed  to  explain  to 
you.  Where  must  we  look  to  hear  the  voice  of  God?  Not  in  the 
deafening  clamor  which  is  so  often  the  expression  of  mere  pas- 
sionate excitement,  but  in  the  calm,  dispassionate  command  of  that 
mysterious  will  which  points  out  to  humanity  the  path  of  devel- 
opment in  civilization.  In  remote  ages,  before  mankind  had  any 
inkling  of  the  physiology  of  digestion  or  of  organic  chemistry,  that 
voice  warned  mankind  that  if  it  would  attain  the  highest  possible 
degree  of  perfection,  it  should  select  as  its  main  article  of  diet — 
bread.  The  Greeks,  who  could  feel  wonder  for  what  really  merited 
that  emotion,  recognized  rightly  enough  the  divine  nature  of  this 
voice;  they  believed  it  to  be  the  voice  of  their  goddess  Demeter. 
The  biology  of  the  present  day,  which  does  not  recognize  meta- 
physics, or  which,  to  speak  more  correctly,  has  introduced,  instead 
of  the  honored  theological  metaphysics  of  former  times,  its  own 
special  scheme  of  biological  metaphysics,  sees  in  that  voice  the 
effect  of  'the  law  of  natural  selection'  which  it  itself  discovered,  a 
law  entirely  analogous  to  that  which  has  assigned  its  own  proper 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  229 

diet  to  every  living  animal.  Yes,  gentlemen,  this  law  of  natural 
selection  which,  in  cases  where  human  society  is  its  subject,  bears 
the  title  of  'sociological  selection' — that  is  the  real  vox  populi  and 
vox  Dei. 

Let  us  now  ask,  in  what  relation  does  this  law  stand  to  our  pres- 
ent question?  the  question  as  to  the  part  played  by  antiquity  in 
the  education  imparted  to  the  youth  of  our  day,  or,  more  briefly, 
to  classical  education.  This,  then,  is  the  relation:  now,  nearly  fif- 
teen hundred  years  after  the  fall  of  Rome,  and  more  than  two 
thousand  years  after  the  fall  of  Greece,  we  find  ourselves  dis- 
puting as  to  whether  the  languages  spoken  by  the  two  classical 
nations  of  antiquity  shall,  or  shall  not,  occupy  the  central  place 
in  the  teaching  of  our  schools.  You  must  needs  eoncede  to  me, 
gentlemen,  that  the  unanimous  testimony  of  centuries  is  a  far  more 
impressive  fact  than  the  ephemeral  verdict  of  modern  society,  even 
were  its  unanimity  less  fictitious  than  in  fact  it  is.  Think  of  the 
picture  which  the  Neva  presents  when  the  fatal  southwest  wind  is 
blowing!  The  set  of  its  waves  is  plainly  to  the  east.  The  river 
seems  running  up-stream  into  the  Lake  of  Ladoga.  And  yet  you 
know  that  every  drop  of  that  lake,  thanks  to  an  invisible  but  very 
real  fall  in  the  earth's  surface,  is  making  its  way  into  the  Gulf  of 
Finland;  and  that  the  only  result  of  this  up-stream  current  pro- 
duced by  the  wind  is  a  temporary  overflow  of  the  Galeerenhafen. 
The  same  phenomenon  is  to  be  witnessed  in  a  community  and  in 
public  opinion.  In  them,  as  in  our  Neva,  there  are  not  one,  but 
two  currents.  There  is  one  which  is  for  show — noisy,  tumultuous, 
and  capricious,  and  followed  by  inundations  and  misfortunes  of 
every  kind;  the  other,  whose  very  existence  is  hardly  suspected 
by  the  former,  is  quiet,  soundless,  and  irresistible.  Two  currents, 
or,  if  you  like,  two  souls,  two  'I's.'  You  may  adopt  for  society 
as  a  whole  the  sharp  division  which  Nietzsche  has  wittily  proposed 
for  the  individual  members  which  compose  it.  He  contrasts  the 
'little  I,'  which  is  self-conscious  and  carries,  relatively  speaking, 
but  small  weight,  with  the  'great  I,'  which,  though  subconscious, 
still  prescribes  with  sovereign  power  the  course  of  public  progress. 
Well,  this  unfavorable  view  entertained  by  the  contemporary  world 
as  to  a  training  in  the  classics,  a  view  which  you  may  be  inclined  to 
oppose  to  my  apparently  isolated  opinion,  is  the  product,  not  of 
the  modern  world  in  its  entirety,  but  merely  of  its  'little  I.'  Of 
course,  this  'little  I'  can,  and  actually  does,  inflict  on  me  as  an 
individual  a  certain  amount  of  annoyance;  but  it  has  no  weight 
with  me  as  a  thinking  man  and  a  historian.    As  such  I  am  in  duty 


230  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

bound  to  attend,  not  to  its  voice,  but  to  the  voice  of  the  mysterious 
'great  F  which  directs  its  destiny.  And  there  I  hear  something 
quite  different;  the  'little  I'  of  the  modern  world  repeats  in  all 
the  notes  of  the  scale : '  Down  with  classical  training ! '  The  '  greater 
I, '  however,  says  to  us :  '  Cherish  it  as  the  apple  of  your  eye ! '  Or, 
to  speak  more  correctly,  it  does  not  actually  say  this  to  us ;  it  has 
itself  cherished  classical  education  for  some  fifteen  or  twenty  cen- 
turies, disregarding  the  repeated  protests  of  its  own  '  little  I ' ;  and 
you  may  be  sure  that  it  will  cherish  it  in  the  future  as  in  the  past. 

However,  we  have  arrived  at  this  result  in  favor  of  antiquity 
only  incidentally.  In  our  next  remarks  we  must  seek  to  establish 
our  claims  with  more  detailed  arguments.  Do  not  attach,  for  the 
meantime,  any  importance  to  our  present  result,  and  merely  bear 
in  mind  what  I  have  said  about  the  two  currents  of  public  opinion 
and  their  relative  value.    And  now  let  us  approach  the  subject. 

At  the  beginning  of  my  lecture  I  insisted  on  the  threefold  signifi- 
cance of  antiquity  for  us:  purely  scientific,  cultural,  and  educa- 
tional. We  will,  however,  adopt  another  order  in  our  course;  we 
will  begin  with  what  concerns  you  all,  and  conclude  with  what 
directly  affects,  or  rather  will  affect,  but  a  few  among  you. 

And  so,  wherein  lies  the  educational  importance  of  a  study  of 
antiquity  ? 

Assuming,  first  of  all,  that  my  answer  to  this  question  must  be 
a  confession  of  ignorance,  or  that  it  prove  in  any  other  way  unsatis- 
factory, what  would  follow?  When  I  explained  to  you  just  now 
the  purport  of  the  law  of  sociological  selection,  I  referred  you,  as 
an  illustration  of  my  meaning,  to  one  remarkable  result  of  such 
selection,  whereby  bread  has  come  to  be  the  principal  article  of 
diet  of  civilized  man.  Permit  me  now  to  use  this  illustration  for 
a  picture  or  allegory,  which,  indeed,  has  served  me  once  before  in 
a  similar  case.  Suppose  that  in  the  times  when  men  were  inclined 
to  regard  the  human  organism  as  a  mechanism,  in  the  days  of 
Helvetius  and  Lamettrie,  a  commission  had  been  appointed  to 
reform  the  diet  of  mankind.  The  speeches  of  the  opponents  of 
the  traditional  methods  of  diet  would  have  first  and  foremost 
drawn  a  gloomy  picture  of  the  physical  condition  of  mankind  at 
that  period.  Man  lives  some  sixty  or  seventy  years  at  most, 
though  nature  intended  him  to  live  two  hundred  years — this  was 
precisely  the  opinion,  later  on,  of  Hufeland;  and  pray  what  sort 
of  a  life  has  he  during  the  brief  space  of  his  existence?  He  is 
feeble  and  clumsy;  he  ages  rapidly;  and  think  of  all  the  failures 
of  physical  life!    And  so  on. 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  231 

Whence  all  this  misery?  Simply  because  his  diet  is  irrational. 
Diet  ought  to  renew  the  human  body ;  but  our  diet  consists  mainly 
of  materials  which  the  human  body  does  not  require,  and,  indeed, 
rids  itself  of  anew,  as  entirely  useless.  Our  bodies  need  flesh,  blood, 
muscles,  marrow,  etc.  In  spite  of  this  demand,  we  supply  them 
almost  entirely  with  a  vegetarian  diet,  of  which  bread  forms  the 
main  factor.  The  mischief  caused  by  bread  is  that  it  stands  com- 
pletely in  the  way  of  other  articles  of  diet  which  are  really  useful ; 
to  prove  its  worthlessness  you  need  only  consider  the  human  body. 
Are  our  arms,  legs,  hands,  and  lungs  composed  of  dough?  Cer- 
tainly not.  Of  what,  then?  Of  blood,  flesh,  muscle,  bones,  and  so 
on.  Well,  then,  pray  give  us  a  genuinely  satisfying  diet,  answer- 
ing to  the  composition  of  our  bodies;  give  us  a  uniform  diet  to 
nourish  the  body  generally,  containing  in  one  harmonious,  evenly- 
proportioned  compound  every  element  needed  by  us  for  the  reno- 
vation of  our  physical  nature — flesh,  blood,  bones,  muscles,  and  so 
on.  Then,  and  not  till  then,  will  the  failures  of  physical  life  dis- 
appear; then  a  man  will  live  a  couple  of  centuries,  and  his  youth 
will  endure  longer  than  his  life  to-day,  and  so  on.  Now,  what 
might  a  supporter  of  the  traditional  diet  have  urged  by  way  of 
rejoinder?  What  might  have  been  his  reply  when  challenged  to 
prove  the  value  of  bread  as  nourishment  ? 

At  the  present  day,  of  course,  an  answer  suggests  itself  as  possible 
which  explains  quite  satisfactorily  all  the  difficulties;  on  the  one 
hand,  physiology  has  thrown  a  light  on  the  process  of  digestion  in 
all  its  details;  on  the  other,  organic  chemistry  has  analyzed  our 
diet  to  its  component  parts.  Chemistry  warrants  us  in  asserting 
that  bread  contains  all,  or  nearly  all,  the  constituents  of  food  neces- 
sary for  the  human  body ;  physiology  helps  us  to  trace  the  way  by 
which  our  organism  assimilates  these  materials.  But  we  were  sup- 
posing ourselves  in  a  period  when  the  process  of  digestion  was  but 
very  imperfectly  understood,  while  organic  chemistry  was  quite 
unknown ;  and  so,  I  repeat,  what  could  the  supporters  of  the  tradi- 
tional methods  of  diet  reply  to  the  champions  of  empirical  dietetics 
of  those  days?  I  fancy  their  reply  might  have  been  as  follows: 
'You  ask  in  what  the  dietetic  value  of  bread,  and,  generally  speak- 
ing, of  a  vegetable  diet,  consists.  That  I  cannot  tell  you.  But  the 
fact  remains  that  the  nations  which  have  adopted  our  food  system 
are  therewith  the  bearers  of  civilization,  while  those  which  diet 
themselves  according  to  your  theories  are  only  the  very  rudest  of 
barbarians.  It  is  also  true  that  the  civilized  nations  multiply  and 
spread,  while  the  savages  who  feed  on  a  meat  diet  are  decreasing 


232  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

in  number,  and  are  being  pushed  ever  further  into  the  background. 
Further,  it  is  a  fact  that  civilized  man,  when  he  is  by  the  force 
of  circumstances  constrained  to  deny  himself  the  use  of  bread  and 
fruit,  and  to  adopt  exclusively  a  meat  diet,  becomes  enfeebled  and 
dies  out.  Finally,  it  is  a  fact  that  you  yourselves,  while  you  have 
correctly  pointed  out  the  shortcomings  of  our  physical  life,  have 
still  failed  to  prove  that  those  shortcomings  are  the  natural  result 
of  our  system  of  diet;  nor  have  you  deigned  to  bestow  any  notice 
on  the  circumstance  that  those  who  follow  your  system  are  neither 
longer  lived,  nor  stronger,  nor  handsomer,  nor  healthier  than  we; 
which  seems  a  mere  mockery  of  the  empirical  method.' 

Such,  I  fancy,  would  have  been  the  answer  of  a  supporter  of  the 
traditional  dietetic  system,  and  his  inference  would  have  been  un- 
assailable. Now  I  pass  on  to  our  present  question.  You  ask  me 
to  show  you  wherein  lies  the  educational  value  of  'antiquity.'  I 
preface  my  answer  by  a  question,  namely :  '  Has  psychology  clearly 
denned  and  explained  the  process  of  intellectual  digestion  in  all  its 
details  ?  Does  there  exist  a  system  of  organic  chemistry  applicable 
to  intellectual  diet,  and  capable  of  providing  a  qualitative  and 
quantitative  analysis  of  this  diet?'  Should  you  then  admit  that 
the  sciences  which  I  have  in  view  are  sciences  of  the  future,  known 
to  us  at  present  only  in  their  beginnings,  you  authorize  me  thereby 
to  make  this  rejoinder:  'What  is  the  educational  value  of  the  study 
of  antiquity?  That  I  do  not,  indeed,  know;  but  it  is  a  fact  that 
the  system  of  classical  education  dates  from  time  out  of  mind ;  that 
it  has  at  the  present  day  spread  to  all  the  nations  who  enjoy  the 
benefit  of  so-called  European  civilization,  and  who,  indeed,  could 
not  be  called  civilized  till  they  adopted  this  system.  It  is,  further, 
true  that  if  we  were  to  follow  the  methods  of  the  meteorologists  and 
express  the  vicissitudes  which  the  system  of  classical  education  has 
experienced  in  the  different  countries  where  it  has  been  adopted 
throughout  all  the  period  of  their  existence  by  the  figure  of  a 
curve,  this  curve  would  be  found  to  express  at  the  same  time  the 
variations  in  the  intellectual  culture  of  these  same  nations.  It 
would  thus  demonstrate  the  close  dependence  of  the  general  culture 
of  any  given  country  on  the  degree  of  importance  attached  to  classi- 
cal education.  Thirdly,  it  is  a  fact  that  in  the  present  day  also 
the  intellectual  influence  of  any  given  nation  asserts  itself  in  pro- 
portion as  classical  education  prevails  in  its  schools ;  whereas  nations 
who  discard  this  system — the  Spaniards,  for  instance — play  no 
great  part  in  the  world  of  ideas,  in  spite  of  their  large  population 
and  glorious  past.    It  is  also  true  that  in  Russia  the  blow  inflicted 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  233 

on  classical  education  by  the  reform  of  the  gymnasia  in  the  year 
1890  has  entailed  a  general  depression  of  the  level  of  education  on 
the  young  men  who  leave  our  gymnasia,  as  is  admitted  even  by  our 
opponents.  And,  lastly,  it  is  true  that  those  who  depict  the  short- 
comings of  our  gymnasia  in  such  sombre  colors  have  failed  to  show 
that  these  shortcomings  are  the  result  of  classical  education;  they 
obstinately  refuse  to  consider  the  fact  that  the  same  shortcomings 
are  manifest  in  the  pupils  of  the  secondary  schools  in  which  classi- 
cal education  plays  no  part.' 

The  inference  is  unassailable.  In  the  interests  of  the  mental  cul- 
ture of  the  Russian  people  we  are  bound  to  aim  at  the  highest  possi- 
ble level  of  classical  training  in  our  gymnasia,  regardless  as  to 
whether  we  succeed  or  not  in  giving  a  satisfactory  answer  to  the 
question  respecting  the  educational  value  of  a  study  of  antiquity. 

And  now,  before  proceeding  further,  let  us  look  back  a  little. 
A  consideration  of  the  history  of  culture  led  us  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  study  of  the  classics  offers  in  itself  the  standard  of  intel- 
lectual diet  of  the  rising  generation.  I  asserted  that  this  conclu- 
sion was  unassailable ;  and,  in  truth,  every  one  who  is  accustomed 
to  weigh  his  words  and  subordinate  his  feelings  to  his  reason  in 
matters  of  science — and  it  is  with  such  that  we  have  now  to  deal — 
is  bound  to  agree  with  me.  But,  unfortunately,  such  persons  are 
rare.  Ordinary  people  subordinate  their  reason  to  their  feelings; 
when  any  proposition  which  they  dislike  is  proved  to  them  to  be 
true,  they  try  to  find  in  what  you  say  some  handle  for  contradic- 
tion ;  and  if  they  succeed  in  hitting  on  any  rejoinder  which  has  but 
an  external  resemblance  to  a  logical  argument,  they  then  allege, 
and  often  themselves  actually  believe,  that  they  have  refuted  you. 
Of  course,  it  is  quite  impossible  to  foresee  refutations  of  this  nature. 
One  way,  and  one  alone,  leads  to  truth ;  whereas  the  paths  to  error 
are  manifold.  But  as  I  am  acquainted  with  much  of  what  has  been 
written  on  the  question  of  the  secondary  schools,  I  can  imagine 
that  my  adversaries  will  find  two  'handles'  in  my  statements. 

This  is  the  first  one.  I  have  just  said,  'in  the  interests  of  the 
mental  culture  of  the  Russian  people.'  I  took  it  for  granted  that 
any  conclusions  which  might  be  drawn  from  the  fluctuations  of 
culture  in  Europe  generally  must  be  equally  applicable  to  Russia. 
Is  this  assumption  correct  1  In  the  ranks  of  my  opponents  there  are 
not  a  few  who  will  refuse  to  recognize  this  connection.  'No,'  say 
they,  'the  claims  of  a  classical  education  are  not  supported  by  the 
history  of  Russia.'  On  this  plea  they  discard  classical  education, 
and  then  proceed  to  launch  projects  of  a  special  school  curriculum 


234  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

of  their  own,  forgetting,  however,  to  inquire  whether  its  claims  are 
supported  by  the  history  of  Russia  or  not.  Matters,  in  truth,  stand 
thus :  however  scanty  the  support  given  to  the  claims  of  a  classical 
education  by  the  facts  of  Russian  history,  any  other  type  of  edu- 
cation, existing  or  proposed,  finds  in  them  absolutely  no  support. 
But  for  us  this  is  not  by  any  means  the  principal  consideration. 
The  main  point  is  this :  Russia  for  a  long  time  possessed  no  system 
of  classical  education ;  the  result  was  that  during  all  that  period  it 
was  not  an  educated  nation ;  nor  did  it  become  so  till  the  introduc- 
tion of  classics  as  an  educational  medium.  That  is  a  fact,  and, 
moreover,  one  which  fully  confirms  my  conclusions. 

The  second  objection  runs  parallel  to  the  first,  and  stands  in  the 
same  relation  to  it  as  time  to  space.  Our  opponents  in  this  camp 
endeavor  to  assume  for  modern  times  just  such  another  exceptional 
position  as  their  allies  assumed  for  Russia.  'In  old  times,'  say 
they,  'the  study  of  antiquity  really  formed  an  important  branch 
of  learning,  for  it  had  lessons  to  teach ;  but  at  the  present  day  we 
have  traveled  far  beyond  it,  and  we  have  nothing  more  to  learn 
from  it. '  These  opponents  are  very  easily  refuted ;  we  have  merely 
to  confront  them  with  the  question :  '  When  do  they  believe  that  we 
outstripped  antiquity?'  That  question  they  cannot  answer.  The 
matter  really  stands  thus:  The  question  of  classical  education,  as 
we  have  seen,  is  subject  to  the  law  of  sociological  selection.  The 
operation  of  this  law  is  determined  by  what  is  known  as  the 
'heterogeneity  of  purposes';  that  is  to  say,  the  non-correspondence 
of  the  real  and  unconscious  purpose  with  the  apparent  and  con- 
scious purpose.  Thus  the  apparent  purpose  of  which  the  bee  is 
conscious  when  it  is  enticed  into  the  recesses  of  a  flower  is  that  the 
creature  may  enjoy  the  sweet  juice ;  the  real  purpose,  on  the  other 
hand,  of  which  the  bee  is  unconscious,  is  that  the  stamina  of  the 
flower  should  be  pulled  about,  and  thereby  produce  its  fructifica- 
tion. 

Precisely  the  same  thing  happens  in  this  case  also.  The  real 
purpose  of  sociological  selection  (it  will  be  understood,  of  course, 
that  I  employ  the  word  '  purpose '  here  in  the  relative  sense  in  which 
it  is  generally  used  in  modern  biology),  in  its  maintenance  of  classi- 
cal education,  has  been  at  all  times  one  and  the  same — namely,  the 
intellectual  and  moral  improvement  of  humanity.  ■  But  the  appar- 
ent purposes  of  which  the  world  was  conscious  were  different.  They 
varied  at  different  times ;  and  this  leads  us  to  make  two  interesting 
observations.  In  the  first  place,  scarcely  has  one  of  these  apparent 
purposes  served  its  time,  so  to  say,  when  another  steps  forward  to 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  235 

take  its  place.  Secondly,  those  nations  which  mistook  the  osten- 
sible apparent  purpose  for  the  real  one,  and  which  endeavored  to 
achieve  it,  not  by  the  path  which  the  law  of  selection  indicated  to 
them,  but  by  a  shorter  and  more  convenient  path,  have  had  a  hard 
judgment  pronounced  on  them  for  their  would-be  omniscience  by 
the  tribunal  of  history.  This  is  precisely  what  we  see  in  biology 
and  biological  laws. 

Originally,  in  the  early  Middle  Ages,  the  apparent  purpose  of 
classical  education  was  the  understanding  of  Holy  Scripture  and  of 
the  Liturgy,  the  works  of  the  Church  Fathers,  the  lives  of  the 
saints,  and  so  on.  Of  course,  there  was  another  method,  more 
simple  and  convenient  for  attaining  this  end,  namely,  the  trans- 
lation of  all  these  writings  into  the  mother  tongue.  This  method 
was  adopted  by  the  nations  of  the  Christian  East,  and  the  conse- 
quence was  that  the  advance  of  culture  left  those  nations  hopelessly 
behind.  At  a  later  period,  in  the  second  half  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
this  purpose  retired  to  the  background  in  favor  of  another — a 
knowledge  of  ancient  science,  as  expounded,  of  course,  in  the  classi- 
cal languages.  Here,  also,  another  shorter  and  more  convenient 
road  was  at  the  service  of  those  who  wished  it — namely,  the  trans- 
lation of  the  scientific  works  of  the  ancients  into  the  mother  tongue. 
This  was  the  course  adopted  by  the  Arabs,  and  it  brought  Moham- 
medan civilization,  after  a  brief  period  of  prosperity,  to  a  speedy 
and  irretrievable  ruin;  as,  indeed,  was  quite  natural,  since  the 
Arabs  transplanted  on  to  their  own  ground  merely  the  flowers  of 
antiquity  severed  from  their  roots,  the  ancient  languages. 

But  this  plan,  too,  was  discarded  at  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages ; 
modern  Europe  had  no  sooner  assimilated  the  science  of  the  ancients 
than  it  passed  beyond  it. 

To  the  question,  then,  propounded  above — namely,  When  did  we 
outstrip  antiquity  in  the  sphere  of  science  ?  our  reply  must  be :  To 
some  extent  as  early  as  the  Middle  Ages.  That  period  discovered 
sciences  that  were  unknown  or  almost  unknown  to  the  ancients,  as, 
for  example,  algebra,  trigonometry,  chemistry,  and  so  on,  and 
raised  the  sciences  already  known  to  a  higher  degree.  It  now 
seemed  that  antiquity  might  really  be  dispensed  with,  and  classical 
culture  did  indeed  begin  to  decline  in  the  fourteenth  century.  But 
precisely  in  this  century  this  same  culture  bloomed  afresh,  rapidly 
and  brilliantly ;  the  Renaissance  has  begun.  Ancient  art,  not  merely 
figurative,  such  as  architecture,  sculpture,  painting,  but  oratorical 
also,  was  discovered  anew.  Men  began  to  study  the  Latin  language 
for  the  sake  of  its  beauties  in  respect  to  form,  and  to  reproduce 


236  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

them  both  in  prose  and  verse.  This  is  what  is  known  as  the  'old 
humanistic  movement.'  The  Latin  language  became  once  again 
the  educator,  so  to  say,  of  the  languages  of  modern  Europe.  The 
result  of  this  influence  of  Latin  is  seen  in  the  elasticity  and  strength, 
in  the  artistic  technique,  of  modern  prose  and  poetry.  The  result, 
then,  was  attained,  and  it  seemed  that  antiquity  might  now  be  rele- 
gated to  archaeological  shelves.  But  no !  Scarcely  had  this  purpose 
begun  to  recede  into  the  background,  when  a  fresh  plan,  the  fourth 
of  these  transitory  purposes,  appeared  to  take  its  place.  The  intel- 
lectual value  of  ancient  literature  was  discovered,  philosophy  being 
its  crown  and  consummation.  Before  that  time  men  had  learnt 
Latin  to  be  able  to  speak  well  and  write  well;  now  they  learnt  it 
to  be  able  to  think  well  and  judge  well,  pour  bien  raisonner. 

Such  was  the  mot  d'ordre  of  the  so-called  'enlightened  views' 
which  started  in  England  during  the  seventeenth  century,  and 
which  continued  in  France  during  the  eighteenth  century,  and  were 
reflected  in  the  culture  of  the  rest  of  the  Europe  of  that  time — 
the  time  of  Newton,  Voltaire,  Frederick  the  Great,  and  Catherine. 
But  already,  in  the  eighteenth  century,  this  one-sided  intellectual- 
ism  called  forth  a  reaction  which  began  in  England  and  in  France 
(as  instanced  by  Rousseau),  but  attained  special  force  in  the  Ger- 
many of  Winckelmann  and  Goethe.  The  watchword  was  now  the 
harmonious  development  of  mankind  in  the  way  pointed  out  by 
nature,  and  the  true  method  of  attaining  this  ideal  was  seen  to  be 
once  again — the  study  of  antiquity. 

Accordingly,  the  Gymnasia  set  about  their  new  task  with  extreme 
energy.  This  is  the  so-called  'new  humanistic  movement.'  Then, 
for  the  first  time,  the  Greek  language  and  literature  claimed  equal 
rights  with  the  Latin ;  for  the  leaders  of  thought  of  that  day  believed 
quite  rightly  that  the  life  of  Greece  approached  their  ideal  nearer 
than  the  life  of  Rome.  At  the  present  moment  we  are  again  in  a 
period  of  transition,  and  we  see  already  clearly  traced  the  new 
point  of  view  from  which  the  coming  century  will  regard  antiquity. 
The  development  of  the  natural  sciences  has  given  prominence  to 
the  principle  of  evolution;  antiquity  has  become  doubly  precious 
to  us  as  the  cradle  of  every  one  of  the  ideas  which  we  have  hitherto 
cherished.  And  we  see  how  humanism  finds  itself  at  variance  with 
the  so-called  'historic  movement'  in  the  very  questions  connected 
with  classical  education.  It  seems,  moreover,  that  the  latter  school 
is  gaining  the  day.  Of  course,  we  shall  have  to  return  to  this 
extremely  important  consideration.  For  the  present,  however,  it 
will  be  sufficient  to  assure  you  that  this  is  already  the  sixth  con- 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  237 

scious  attitude  in  regard  to  the  importance  of  the  study  of  antiq- 
uity. It  has  made  its  appearance  just  in  the  nick  of  time  to 
relieve  the  'new  humanistic'  attitude. 

It  is  curious,  too,  to  trace  the  changes  which  have  passed  over 
the  methods  of  instruction  in  classical  education  according  to  the 
different  points  of  view  from  which  the  purpose  of  this  study  was 
apprehended.  I  am  unable  to  dwell  on  this  at  length.  I  must 
rest  content  with  indicating  the  most  obvious  and  palpable  changes 
which  are  expressed  in  the  choice  of  authors  at  each  different  epoch. 
During  the  first  period,  when  Latin  was  studied  for  the  salvation  of 
the  soul,  we  find,  as  is  natural,  that  religious  works  form  the  cen- 
tral point  of  the  curriculum.  During  the  second,  which  we  may 
call  the  scientific  period,  the  main  subjects  of  study  were  the  hand- 
books of  the  respective  sciences,  such  as  the  Latin  Aristotle  and 
the  so-called  Aries — that  is  to  say,  treatises  on  mathematics  and 
astronomy,  and  also  on  medicine  and  law,  and  so  on.  In  the  third, 
or  'old  humanistic'  epoch,  it  was  Cicero  as  the  master  of  Latin 
oratory.  In  the  fourth,  the  epoch  of  '  enlightenment, '  it  was  Cicero 
again,  but  this  time  as  the  philosopher.  In  the  fifth,  the  'new 
humanistic'  period,  it  was  Homer,  the  tragic  poets,  and  Horace. 
"We  are  living  on  the  traditions  of  this  period,  but  already  there 
is  felt  a  growing  need  of  a  careful  selection  from  ancient  literature, 
so  as  to  represent  antiquity  to  young  scholars  as  precisely  the 
cradle  of  our  ideas. 

Quite  recently  Wilamowitz  in  Germany  has  sought  to  meet  this 
need  by  compiling  a  Greek  Reading-Book,  and  his  experiment  has 
deeply  interested  all  the  teaching  profession  in  his  own  country. 
No  doubt  this  movement  will  in  time  reach  us  in  Russia  as  well; 
very  probably  it  would  have  made  its  presence  felt  already,  were 
it  not  for  the  recent  unrest  in  our  schools.  However  this  may  be, 
I  have  shown  you  the  series  of  changing  points  of  view  from  which 
the  study  of  antiquity  has  been  regarded  during  the  different 
periods  of  our  civilization.  This,  too,  may  serve  as  an  answer  to  the 
ignorant  reproach  that  we  have  nothing  now  to  learn  from  antiq- 
uity, as  we  have  outstripped  it ;  and  likewise  to  the  equally  ignorant 
reproach  that  classical  studies  have  come  to  a  standstill,  and  are 
not  keeping  up  with  the  times.  But  all  these  aims  were,  as  I  have 
stated,  transitory.  They  were  aims  towards  which  society  con- 
sciously strove  in  each  of  the  periods  mentioned,  and  society  has 
rendered  an  account  for  them  alike  to  itself  and  to  us.  The  true 
aim,  however,  of  which  men  were  not  conscious,  was  the  all-impor- 
tant goal  to  which  all  selection  tends; — namely,  the  improvement  of 


238  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

humanity ;  in  this  case  man 's  cultural,  that  is  to  say,  his  intellectual 
and  moral,  improvement. 

But,  it  may  be  asked,  in  what  way  does  the  path  of  classical  edu- 
cation tend  to  improve  mankind  intellectually  and  morally?  This 
very  question  suggests  another :  Wherein  lies  the  educational  value 
of  antiquity?  We  have  already  raised  this  latter  question,  and 
before  answering  it  I  proved  to  you  that,  whether  our  answer  may 
seem  satisfactory  or  not,  the  fact  remains  indisputable  that  the 
study  of  antiquity  is  an  extremely  important  element  in  education. 
This  has  been  unmistakably  shown,  quite  independently  of  that 
answer,  by  considerations  adduced  from  the  history  of  culture.  I 
beg  you  to  bear  in  mind  this  fact ;  I  attach  the  greatest  importance 
to  it.  Precisely  in  the  same  way  the  value  of  bread  as  an  article 
of  diet  was  well  established  long  before  it  had  been  proved  by 
physiology  and  organic  chemistry.  What  is  physiology  in  this 
instance?  The  analysis  of  the  consuming  organism.  And  chem- 
istry? The  analysis  of  the  substance  consumed.  Now  substitute 
mind  for  body,  education  for  diet,  and  antiquity  for  bread.  Do 
there,  then,  exist  sciences  in  this  connection  analogous  to  physiology 
and  organic  chemistry?  that  is  to  say,  sciences  which  teach  us  how 
to  analyze  the  organism  of  the  consumer  and  the  matter  consumed  ? 
Let  us  see. 

The  consuming  element  is  in  this  case  the  human  intellect.  Its 
analysis  is  the  business  of  psychology,  and  that  science  is  at  present 
still  in  a  state  of  infancy.  Psychology  is  as  yet  unable  to  reply  to 
all  the  questions  addressed  to  her.  This  is,  indeed,  true  of  physiol- 
ogy as  well ;  but  still,  the  latter  science  has  been  vastly  more  devel- 
oped, and  is  older  alike  in  years  and  in  experience.  Now,  as  to  the 
analysis  of  the  diet  for  consumption,  that  is  to  say,  antiquity.  This 
analysis  is  not  intrinsically  very  difficult,  but  in  this  case  a  study 
of  the  effects  of  its  elements  upon  man's  psychological  nature  is 
indispensable;  in  fact,  a  kind  of  psychological  science  of  knowl- 
edges. And  no  such  science  is  yet  in  existence,  as  the  mere  com- 
bination of  the  words  shows  you.  So,  gentlemen,  you  must  not 
ask  too  much  from  me.  I  have  promised  you  to  answer  the  ques- 
tion proposed,  and  will  do  so  as  far  as  possible  with  >the  present 
state  of  psychological  sciences.  As  I  have  remarked,  these  are 
sciences  of  the  future;  yet  they  have  already  established  certain 
principles  upon  a  fairly  sure  basis,  and  their  methods  are  becoming 
ever  more  and  more  accurate,  so  that  we  are  at  least  able  to  appre- 
hend in  what  manner  and  in  what  direction  a  satisfactory  answer 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  239 

to  the  questions  which  beset  us  is  to  be  looked  for.  Yes,  I  can  affirm 
so  much ;  but  I  beg  you  to  remember  that  this  is  merely  a  temporary 
answer,  and  that  a  much  fuller  and  more  convincing  answer  can  be 
given  only  by  our  posterity.  But  before  fulfilling  my  promise  I 
must  beg  you  to  bear  with  me  while  I  make  a  few  remarks  on  the 
real  meaning  of  the  term  'educational  value.'  I  am  particularly 
anxious  that  you  should  accept  nothing  from  me  without  a  severe 
custom-house  scrutiny,  so  to  speak.  This  may  detain  us  for  a  few 
minutes,  but  in  return  I  shall  hope  to  gain  later  on  somewhat  more 
of  your  confidence. 

And  so  I  put  the  question :  In  what  sense  are  we  to  understand 
the  expression  '  educational  value '  ? 

Let  us  begin  with  the  most  concrete  example  possible.  A  car- 
penter has  a  son.  He  wishes  to  teach  him  a  carpenter's  trade.  In 
this  instance  the  problem  is  simple  and  intelligible  to  all.  The 
carpenter's  schooling  prepares  the  boy  directly  for  real  life;  every 
knack  of  the  trade  which  the  boy  learns  will  be  eminently  useful 
to  him  in  his  future  work,  and  in  precisely  the  same  way.  We  can 
easily  picture  to  ourselves  a  carpenter's  school;  it  will  be,  in  fact, 
what  we  call  a  professional  or  technical  school.  Is  there  any  justi- 
fication for  its  existence  ?  Undoubtedly  there  is,  if  you  admit  that 
it  is  possible  or  desirable  to  settle  the  trade  or  profession  of  a  boy 
at  such  an  early  age.  But  is  the  principle  of  'professional  utili- 
tarianism' applicable  to  intellectual  as  well  as  to  manual  training? 
To  some  extent  this  may  be  so,  as  theological  schools,  military  and 
naval  academies,  and  other  secondary  schools  of  the  kind  may  serve 
to  show ;  but  it  is  only  partially  applicable. 

For  most  intellectual  professions  there  are  no  such  schools  in 
existence;  and  even  those  which  I  have  just  mentioned  are  trying 
more  and  more  to  free  themselves  from  their  narrow  professional 
character,  and  to  look  with  favor  on  a  general  education  at  the 
expense  of  any  special  branch.  And,  generally  speaking,  it  is 
recognized  that  we  need  schools  which  do  not  insist  upon  determin- 
ing a  priori  the  future  profession  of  their  scholars. 

What,  then,  should  be  the  nature  of  such  schools,  assuming  always 
that  they  are  intended  to  prepare  their  scholars  for  real  life,  that  is 
to  say,  for  their  future  trade  or  profession  1  This  is  the  problem  of 
squaring  the  circle  as  applied  to  educational  questions;  and  the 
efforts  made  to-day  to  solve  it  are  as  successful  as  those  directed  in 
former  "days  at  the  solution  of  that  famous  mathematical  puzzle 
itself.    I  will  indicate  certain  methods  of  solving  the  problem  which 


240  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

recommend  themselves  to  the  man  in  the  street.    The  first  of  these 
is  as  follows. 

There  is  a  demand  for  a  school  to  train  the  future  lawyers,  doctors, 
professors  of  natural  history,  engineers,  mathematicians,  scholars, 
and  so  on;  so  far,  so  good.  Its  program  will  embrace  all  the  sub- 
jects of  study  which  are  common  to  all  these  departments  of  science. 
The  shortcomings  of  this  system  are  plain  enough ;  the  fact  is  that 
there  are  no  such  common  courses  of  study,  or,  at  least,  extremely 
few.  You  have  only  to  compare  the  lists  of  lectures  provided  for 
the  faculty  of  law  with  those  for  the  faculty  of  natural  science,  or 
the  program  of  courses  in  history  and  classics  with  that  of  any 
technical  institute,  and  you  will  be  convinced  of  this.  Now  con- 
sider the  second  possible  way.  Select,  if  you  please,  in  equal  pro- 
portions courses  of  law,  medicine,  physics,  mathematics,  history, 
classics,  and  other  subjects,  and  out  of  these  try  and  concoct  a  pro- 
gram fit  for  a  secondary  school!  Now,  there  are  people  simple 
enough  to  believe  that  this  is  feasible ;  it  is,  however,  an  utter  impos- 
sibility. In  the  first  place  we  are  confronted  with  a  confusing  and 
deadening  multiplicity  of  subjects,  and  in  the  second  place  the 
principle  of  utilitarianism  is  not  even  now  maintained,  for  such  a 
school  cannot  offer  any  of  its  scholars  more  than  a  tenth  part  of 
what  he  requires.  Thus  we  may  ask :  What  sort  of  a  school  is  that 
which  combines  a  bare  tenth  of  useful  material  with  nine-tenths 
of  ballast  ? 

There  is  a  third  way.  Admitting  the  untenability  of  the  first 
two  solution's,  one  may  propose  to  disregard  entirely  in  our  second- 
ary schools  the  future  career  of  our  scholars,  and  demand  merely 
that  they  leave  the  schools  as  educated  persons.  In  other  words, 
professional  and  utilitarian  considerations  are  deliberately  eschewed 
and  the  principle  merely  of  education  introduced.  So  far,  so  good. 
But  what  do  we  mean  by  an  educated  person  ?  The  answer  cannot 
be  far  to  seek ;  for  we  know  that  there  are  educated  persons.  What, 
then,  must  one  know  to  be  an  educated  person  ?  An  author  of  great 
reputation  in  educational  matters  has  proposed  a  radical  measure 
for  the  solution  of  this  problem.  His  idea  was  to  subject  educated 
persons  to  a  catechism,  in  other  words,  to  an  examination,  and  so 
establish  a  standard  of  departments  of  knowledge  without  which  a 
man  would  not  be  '  educated, '  and  then  to  make  these  departments 
of  knowledge  the  subjects  of  school-instruction.  It  would  be  amus- 
ing to  carry  out  this  plan  and  watch  the  results.  You  understand, 
of  course,  that  under  this  system  those  departments  of  knowledge 
which  one  educated  man  possesses  still  do  not  fall  into  the  general 


OUR  DEBT  TO  ANTIQUITY  241 

program,  if  there  be  a  second  educated  man  who  does  not  possess 
them;  for  that  shows  that  one  can  be  educated  even  without  their 
possession.  Indeed,  we  might  imagine  a  prodigy  who  could  tell  us 
the  names  of  thirty  Patagonian  villages — that  is  his  specialty ;  but 
we  could  incorporate  into  our  program  only  what  all  educated 
society,  or  at  least  the  greater  part  of  it,  knows  about  Patagonia; 
that  is  to  say,  nothing  at  all.  And  so  it  would  be  with  all  the  other 
courses.  And  the  net  result  would  be :  in  arithmetic  the  four  rules 
concerning  whole  numbers,  with  a  general  knowledge  of  fractions; 
in  geometry,  a  few  ordinary  ideas  about  figures  and  solid  bodies ;  in 
algebra,  nothing;  in  trigonometry,  nothing;  and  so  on  in  its  en- 
tirety; a  program  which  one  or  two  gymnasium  classes  would 
fully  exhaust.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  this  way,  too,  fails  to  lead  us 
to  our  goal.  What,  then,  is  the  mistake?  It  lies  in  this,  that  we 
consider  education  to  be  the  mere  acquirement  of  knowledge.  But 
whereas  knowledge  is  forgotten,  education  is  never  lost;  an  edu- 
cated person,  even  though  he  have  forgotten  all  that  he  has  learnt, 
remains  an  educated  person.  In  making  this  statement  I  am  very 
far  from  wishing  to  underestimate  the  importance  of  knowledge; 
on  the  contrary,  I  maintain  that  a  man's  utility  is  in  proportion  to 
his  knowledge.  But,  gentlemen,  different  persons  require  different 
branches  of  knowledge.  That  is  the  case  even  at  present,  and  will 
in  the  future  be  more  the  case  than  ever;  for  knowledge  is  ever 
becoming  more  and  more  specialized.  The  number  of  branches  of 
knowledge  indispensable  to  all,  or  indeed  to  all  educated  persons, 
is  even  at  present  far  from  large,  and  must  diminish  in  every 
generation  as  knowledge  itself  continues  to  increase  and  conse- 
quently to  be  specialized.  And  thus  to  draw  up  the  courses  of 
learning  for  our  secondary  schools  on  these  principles  is  an  impos- 
sibility. And  still  it  is  the  duty  of  such  schools  to  give  all  those  who 
are  afterwards  to  be  educated  persons  precisely  what  is  likely  to 
benefit  them  all  alike;  that  is  their  whole  object.  And  how  shall 
they  best  fulfil  this  duty  ?  Obviously  by  preparing  a  scholar's  mind 
to  embrace  any  branch  of  knowledge  which  he  may  need  afterwards 
with  the  least  possible  expenditure  of  time  and  strength,  and  with 
the  greatest  possible  advantage  to  himself.  This  is  a  truism,  stale 
if  you  will,  but  a  truism  that  defies  contradiction,  and  is,  in  fact, 
irrefutable. 

If  it  were  my  task  to  draw  up  a  program  for  our  secondary 
schools,  I  would  endeavor  to  convince  you,  on  the  grounds  of  what 
I  have  said,  that  it  must  contain  the  following:  first,  courses  pro- 
viding a  general  knowledge,  and  secondly,  courses  providing  a 


242  THADDAEUS  ZIELINSKI 

general  education ;  the  latter  class  would  naturally  rank  as  the  more 
important.  And  to  this  latter  class  would  naturally  belong  the 
courses  on  mathematics,  physics,  and  classics,  corresponding  to  the 
three  methods  of  human  thought — the  deductive,  the  inductive- 
experimental,  and  the  inductive-observant. 


XVIII 

AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM1 

By  Basil  L.  Gildersleeve 

Hesperia,  the  Western  land,  was  to  the  Greek  of  old  the  Land 
of  Hope,  and  our  Western  land  is  the  Land  of  Hope  to  the  Greek 
of  to-day.  The  island  of  Pelops  is  almost  depopulated  by  the  stream 
of  emigration  to  the  modern  Atlantis,  and  the  Greek  of  to-day 
recognizes  in  the  Americanism  of  to-day  the  traits  of  an  ideal 
Hellenism.  And  so,  though  I  am  not  a  Greek  of  to-day,  but  only  a 
Grecian,  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  the  recognition  of  the  affini- 
ties of  ancient  Greek  and  modern  American  life,  which  I  have 
dared  to  call  the  American  element  in  Greek  life,  may  serve  to 
quicken  the  interest  of  the  student  of  the  Greek  language  and 
literature,  and  even  if  it  abide  alone,  may  wake  the  sense  of  kin- 
dred, after  the  forms  of  the  Greek  alphabet  become  misty. 

This  general  theme  has  always  been  a  favorite  of  mine.  Creon 
tells  his  son  Haemon  that  Antigone  is  'a  frigid  hugging-piece, ' 
and  however  frigid  my  hugging-piece  may  seem  to  others,  I  have 
pursued  it  as  a  phantom  of  delight  ever  since  I  knew  what  love  is, 
now  through  the  crowds  of  the  Agora,  now  round  the  steps  of  the 
Bema,  now  over  the  meadows  of  the  Muses  where  Aristophanes 
disports  himself,  now  over  battlefields  illuminated  by  stark  figures 
in  blue  and  gray.  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  this  pursuit  has 
made  for  life,  but  like  everything  that  makes  for  life,  it  has  brought 
with  it  trouble,  and  my  indiscreet  urging  of  the  theme  has  cost 
me  more  than  one  rebuke.  So,  for  instance,  in  one  of  my  essays 
I  said:  'It  is  not  in  vain  that  the  American  student  has  been  en- 
dowed with  "that  singular  buoyancy  and  elasticity"  which,  accord- 

[iThis  is  the  third  lecture  (pp.  87-130)  in  Professor  Gildersleeve 's  Hellas 
and  Hesperia,  or  the  Vitality  of  Greek  Studies  in  America,  Three  Lectures, 
delivered  at  the  University  of  Virginia  under  the  conditions  of  the  Barbour- 
Page  Foundation,  and  published  (New  York)  in  1909.  It  is  reprinted  with 
the  consent  of  the  Eector  and  Visitors  of  the  University  of  Virginia;  slight 
changes  have  been  introduced  at  the  request  of  Professor  Gildersleeve. — 
Editor.] 


244  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

ing  to  Dean  Stanley,  is  the  marked  peculiarity  of  our  people,  nor 
in  vain  our  unequaled  adaptability,  our  quick  perception,  our 
straightforwardness  of  intellectual  vision.  We  Americans,  said 
Matthew  Arnold,  think  straight  and  see  clear. '  And  again : 
'Ancient  history  has  to  be  interpreted  into  terms  of  American  expe- 
rience, and  it  would  not  be  saying  too  much  to  maintain  that  many 
of  the  aspects  of  American  life  enable  us  to  understand  the  ancients 
better  than  some  of  our  European  contemporaries  do.  An  auda- 
cious, inventive,  ready-witted  people,  Americans  often  comprehend 
the  audacious,  inventive,  ready-witted  Greek  a  demi-mot,  while  the 
German  professor  phrases  and  the  English  "don"  rubs  his  eyes, 
and  the  French  savant  appreciates  the  wrong  half.'  Whereupon 
a  British  reviewer  charged  me  with  'vainglorious  patriotism.' 
Sometimes,  it  is  true,  I  stop  and  ask  myself  in  an  access  of  disillu- 
sionment, What  right  have  I  to  speak  of  America  ?  and  I  hear  snub- 
nosed  Socrates  asking,  'What  is  American?'  'Tis  a  harder  ques- 
tion perhaps  for  a  man  of  my  antecedents  than  'What  is  Greek?' 
In  the  first  place,  a  native  is  too  native  to  give  the  right  answer, 
and  I  dare  not  invoke  the  aid  of  such  apostles  of  Americanism  as 
Professor  Brander  Matthews,  Dr.  Henry  van  Dyke,  or  President 
Butler,  the  most  recent  American  authorities  on  the  subject;  and 
in  order  to  be  truly  scientific,  I  should  have  to  muster  the  evidence 
of  others,  from  Trollope  and  Basil  Hall  of  the  old  time,  through 
Dickens  of  a  later  date,  down  to  the  witnesses  of  our  own  day, 
frivolous  Max  O'Rell,  unsympathetic  Matthew  Arnold,  and  sym- 
pathetic James  Bryce,  and  on  the  basis  of  those  documents  draw  up 
a  table  of  American  characteristics  in  which  they  all  agree — our 
keenness  and  directness,  our  audacity,  our  inventiveness,  our  light- 
hearted  acceptance  of  the  shifts  of  fortune,  a  light-heartedness  that 
makes  the  Greek  Theramenes  an  American  statesman,  as  he  has 
recently  been  made  the  hero  of  an  historical  novel,  a  novel  by  an 
American  Hellenist,  Professor  Gaines.  Time  was  when  we,  men  of 
the  South,  were  more  bent  on  asserting  diversity  than  unity,  a 
diversity  that  was  the  result  of  the  conflicting  interests,  the  inces- 
sant bickerings,  the  different  ideals,  the  different  social  conditions. 
But  we  are  all  Americans  now,  and  our  Americanism  is  borne  in 
upon  us  by  foreign  critics,  who  were  the  first  to  teach  us  that  Walt 
Whitman,  whom  we  all  derided  fifty  years  ago,  is  the  true  Ameri- 
can poet  and  prophet;  all  the  others  mere  echoes  of  European 
voices.  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  Walt  Whitman  would  not  have 
heeded  the  scholar's  plea  for  the  classics.  You  may  remember  his 
deliverance  in  his  Leaves  of  Grass: 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  245 

Dead  poets,  philosophs,  priests, 

Martyrs,  artists,  inventors,  governments  long  since, 

Language-shapers,  on  other  shores, 

Nations  once  powerful,  now  reduced,  withdrawn,  or  desolate, 

I  dare  not  proceed  till  I  respectfully  credit  what  you  have  left, 

wafted  hither. 
I  have  perused  it,  own  it  is  admirable  (moving  awhile  among  it), 
Think  nothing  can  ever  be  greater,  nothing  can  ever  deserve  more 

than  it  deserves. 
Regarding  it  all  intently  a  long  while,  then  dismissing  it, 
I  stand  in  my  place,  with  my  own  day,  here.. 

There  is  much  more  to  the  same  effect  in  our  typical  American  poet 
whom  Tennyson  admired  and  George  Eliot  quoted,  and  nothing 
could  be  more  characteristic  than  the  utterance : 

I  stand  in  my  place,  with  my  own  day,  here. 

And  as  an  American,  I  am  fully  in  accord  with  him.  A  detached 
American  is  for  the  most  part  a  pitiful  spectacle.  But  it  is  pre- 
cisely because  we  stand  in  our  place  with  our  own  day,  here,  that 
we  cannot  dismiss  the  past  so  cavalierly  as  Whitman  has  done.  To 
the  dead  all  things  are  dead.  To  him  that  is  alive  there  is  no  dead 
poetry,  no  dead  language.  'Only  those  languages,'  said  Lowell  in 
a  famous  discourse,  'only  those  languages  can  be  called  dead  in 
which  nothing  living  was  ever  written. '  There  is  no  need  of  credit- 
ing the  past,  as  Whitman  calls  it.  The  past  collects  its  interest  by 
the  inevitable  process  of  eternal  laws.  Classical  antiquity  is  not 
driftwood,  as  Whitman  intimates,  not  driftwood  out  of  which  to 
build  fires  on  the  shore  of  life,  calling  up  the  figures  of  Jason  and 
Medea,  of  Paris  and  Helen,  and  listening  to  Arion  in  his  singing- 
robes.  The  classical  caravel  is  still  seaworthy.  No  Captain  Cour- 
ageous of  Gloucester,  Massachusetts,  is  more  popular  than  Odysseus 
of  Ithaca.  Retell  the  story  of  the  wanderings  of  the  much-enduring 
to  a  popular  audience,  if  you  wish  to  find  out  whether  Homer  is 
dead,  and  what  Kipling  calls  'his  bloomin'  lyre'  has  ceased  to 
bloom.  No  happier  hours  in  my  long  career  can  I  recall  than  those 
I  spent  in  repeating  the  tale  of  Old  Audacious  to  a  sympathetic 
audience  thirty  years  ago.  Tennyson's  Ulysses  I  need  not  men- 
tion. Stephen  Phillips '  Ulysses  I  mention  merely  to  protest  against 
his  perversion  of  the  only  true  story  of  Odysseus  in  Hades.  It  is, 
then,  precisely  because  we  stand  in  our  own  place,  here,  precisely 
because  we  are  Americans  and  Walt  Whitman  is  our  prophet,  that 


246  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

we  insist  on  our  inheritance  of  the  precious  past,  on  which  and  by 
which  we  live. 

But  I  have  already  spoken  of  Greek  as  an  inheritance.  To-day 
we  are  to  consider  not  so  much  the  inheritance  as  the  kinship. 
Hellas  speaks  to  us  with  a  kindred  voice,  and  looks  into  our  eyes 
with  kindred  eyes.  Like  the  Greeks,  we  Americans  have  found  out 
our  oneness  by  conflict  with  one  another,  as  well  as  by  contrast 
with  others.  The  members  of  the  same  family  seldom  see  the  like- 
ness that  strangers  recognize  at  once.  There  is  a  national  hand- 
writing among  all  the  diversities  of  chirography,  and  we  write 
American  as  we  are  written  down  Americans.  American  is  as 
distinctive  now  as  Greek  was  then,  and  it  was  War,  the  father  of 
all  things,  that  revealed  us  to  ourselves.  America  is  a  find  to  the 
American  as  Greece  was  a  find  to  the  Greeks,  to  adapt  the  famous 
passage  of  Herodotus.  It  was  the  Persian  war  that  gave  Greece 
her  unity — a  war  in  which  the  Greeks  themselves  were  arrayed  on 
different  sides,  and  no  sooner  was  the  unity  brought  about  than  the 
old  enmity  asserted  itself,  and  Greece  was  split  in  twain — North 
against  South  and  South  against  North. 

True,  these  historical  parallels  are  not  to  be  urged.  The  unity 
of  the  Greek  state  was  the  city,  the  polls,  and  recent  historians 
justly  lay  great  stress  on  the  difference  between  the  city-state,  the 
Stadtstaat,  and  the  territorial  state,  the  Flachenstaat.  We  are  not 
to  be  misled  by  a  name.  The  'fierce  democratic '  of  Athens  was  a 
narrow  oligarchy  according  to  modern  conceptions,  and  the  city- 
state  was  a  mere  atom  in  comparison  with  our  empire  states.  But 
there  are  analogies  that  cannot  be  lightly  thrust  aside  as  mere 
fancies.  Greek  history  is  after  all  in  some  respects  a  pocket  edi- 
tion of  American  history,  and  the  founders  of  the  Union  turned  to 
Greek  history  rather  than  to  Roman  history  when  they  considered 
the  problems  of  Federal  government;  just  as  in  the  recent  devel- 
opment of  American  life,  the  Roman  Empire  is  ever  in  our  thoughts 
and  on  our  lips.  A  writer  famous  in  his  day,  Alphonse  Karr,  in  his 
Journey  round  my  Garden,  ridicules  the  botanist  because  he  neg- 
lects the  element  of  size.  '  The  same  botanical  description, '  he  says, 
'applies  to  the  baobab  tree,  which  looks  like  a  forest  in  itself,  the 
circumference  of  its  trunk  a  hundred  feet,  its  age  6,000  years,  and 
to  the  mallow,  a  little  trailing  plant  with  rose-colored  leaves,  so 
small  that  you  can  hardly  see  it  in  the  grass. '  And  yet  the  botanist 
is  not  so  far  wrong  after  all.  In  America  we  are  apt  to  overstress 
the  element  of  size.  It  is  a  national  reproach  that  we  do  not  dis- 
tinguish 'bigness'  and  'greatness.'     The  organic  structure  is  the 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  247 

same  under  different  manifestations,  and  so  the  pocket-handker- 
chief domain  of  Hellas  has  the  same  weft  as  the  enormous  canvas 
of  our  American  continent. 

Those  who  emphasize  the  influence  of  physical  surroundings  in 
the  character  of  a  nation — and  the  emphasis  is  as  old  as  the  scribe 
that  left  on  record  the  story  of  Issachar — are  never  weary  of  en- 
larging on  the  diversity  of  Greek  climate,  Greek  soil,  Greek  pro- 
ductions, as  determining  the  character  of  the  Greek  people.  It  is 
an  old  story.  It  is  told  in  Homer,  it  is  the  keynote  of  Herodotus. 
It  is  writ  large  in  Polybius,  in  Strabo.  Curtius,  the  historian  of 
Alexander  the  Great,  following  Greek  authorities,  doubtless,  makes 
the  climate  of  India  responsible  for  the  character  of  the  Hindus, 
and  oddly  enough,  it  is  a  modern  Curtius  that  has  penned  the  fas- 
cinating chapters  in  which  he  unfolds  the  influence  of  land  and  sea 
on  the  Greek  people.  Every  geographer,  every  historian,  comments 
on  the  great  variety  of  Greek  climate — marvelous  variety,  consider- 
ing the  limited  extent  of  Greek  territory  proper.  The  extremes  are 
perhaps  not  quite  so  great  as  in  this  country,  but  racial  sensitive- 
ness might  restore  the  parallel  in  one  direction,  as  facilities  of  com- 
munication would  restore  the  parallel  in  another.  From  Maine  to 
Florida  is  practically  not  so  far  as  from  Thessaly  to  Laconia  in  the 
heyday  of  ancient  Greek  life.  But  what  of  the  universal  neigh- 
borhood of  the  sea?  No  part  of  Greek  territory  was  more  than 
forty  miles  from  what  they  called  in  one  mood,  Her  that  troubleth, 
thalatta,  in  other  moods,  Him  that  bridgeth,  pontos  (indefensible 
etymologies,  I  fear,  but  undoubted  facts).  To  the  foreigner  the 
American  prairie  has  become  more  characteristic  than  the  Ameri- 
can coast-line ;  and  the  American  flag  is  rarely  seen  in  foreign  ports. 
The  Greeks  were  a  maritime  people,  and  the  dwellers  on  our  vast 
plains  can  hardly  be  called  a  seafaring  people,  but  their  language 
is  our  language,  and  English,  American  English,  like  Greek,  is  full 
of  nautical  imagery:  we  'ship'  our  goods;  we  'board'  our  cars. 
One  recognizes  the  old  Norse  yearning  for  the  sea  in  the  prairie 
schooner,  and  far  in  the  interior  the  echoes  of  the  old  Viking  time 
are  easily  waked.  It  is  not  without  significance  that  our  battleships 
bear  the  names  of  the  different  States,  and  inland  Tennessee  is  as 
vitally  interested  in  her  namesake  as  Virginia,  whose  capes  stretch 
out  to  receive  the  commerce  of  the  world.  A  favorite  theme  of  the 
ancient  sophists  was  the  reflections  of  an  inlander  at  sight  of  a 
ship.  There  is  no  American  inlander  of  whom  such  a  fancy  could 
be  entertained.  The  new  navy  draws  its  recruits  from  the  "Western 
States  as  from  the  Eastern.    The  great  lakes,  the  great  rivers,  pro- 


248  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

vide  for  the  training  of  the  man  from  Ohio  and  the  man  from  Mis- 
souri, and  offer  watery  paths  for  the  'whalebacks'  of  the  Michi- 
gander  and  the  Chicagese.  So  even  at  this  point  of  seeming  dis- 
similarity there  is  a  certain  analogy  between  Greek  and  American. 
Despite  all  the  preachments  of  political  economists,  and  all  the 
frightful  waste  of  naval  armaments,  Americans  like  Greeks  are  all 
sea-fighters,  just  as  the  Lacedaemonians,  who  were  late  in  learn- 
ing the  lesson,  learned  it  too  well  for  the  Athenians,  who  were  born 
to  the  sea. 

But  continental  Greece  was  not  all  of  Greece.  The  whole  Medi- 
terranean was  fringed  with  Greek  colonies — to  adopt  a  figure  of 
Cicero's — and  it  might  well  be  maintained,  as  has  been  main- 
tained by  Mr.  Freeman,  that  the  true  analogue  of  the  United 
States,  which  we  do  not  hesitate  to  call  America,  is  the  Cocked  Hat 
Island.  Sicily  lay  in  the  region  which  was  to  the  Greeks  the  Land 
of  Promise.  Westward  Ho !  was  an  old  cry  in  the  time  of  Archil- 
ochus.  The  West  was,  as  I  have  said,  the  Land  of  Hope  to  the 
Greeks,  and  it  is  America  that  is  still  the  Hope  of  this  Pandora 
world.  America  is  the  last  word  of  modern  history,  as  Greece  was 
the  last  word  of  ancient  history.  Like  the  Greeks,  we  are  the  heirs 
of  the  ages.  The  Romans  were  not  ancients.  The  Romans  are  of 
us,  and  we  are  living  their  life,  so  that  it  is  not  necessary  to  hunt 
up  more  or  less  remote  analogies.  When  we  read  Ferrero,  we  are 
reading  the  history  of  our  own  times.  Modern  research  has  pushed 
antiquity  far  back,  and,  with  our  large  knowledge  of  early  condi- 
tions, much  that  was  considered  axiomatic  in  my  youth  would  be 
set  down  as  nonsense  now.  Think  of  the  elaborate  discussions  as 
to  the  antiquity  of  the  art  of  writing.  If  any  one  were  to  broach 
such  a  subject  now,  we  should  be  tempted  to  use  the  argumentum 
laterculinum  of  our  cousins  on  the  other  side,  and  heave  a  Nine- 
vitish  brick  at  him.  No  sooner  do  we  reach  by  the  instrumentality 
of  the  spade  what  we  consider  the  bed-rock  of  ancient  culture, 
than  the  bed-rock  turns  out  to  be  no  bed-rock  at  all,  but  a  layer  of 
concrete  superimposed  on  yet  other  layers.  No  sooner  do  we  begin 
to  speak  of  Mycenaean  civilization  than  we  have  to  consider  pre- 
Mycenaean  conditions.  The  Hittites  had  it  all  their  own  way  for 
a  while,  and  we  were  inclined  to  bargain  with  them  as  did  Abra- 
ham for  a  place  in  which  to  bury  dead  theories,  other  people 's  dead 
theories,  but  the  other  -ites  are  bound  to  have  their  innings. 
Enough,  the  Greeks  are  to  us  as  they  were  to  the  Egyptians  of  old — 
mere  children — and,  if  children,  then  heirs  as  we  are  of  a  rich 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  249 

world  of  achievement  and  experience.    In  time,  then,  as  in  space, 
the  American  is  as  the  Greek. 

And  the  American,  like  the  Greek,  has  proceeded  to  realize  his 
inheritance,  and  that  inheritance  is  the  republican,  or,  if  you 
choose,  the  democratic,  form  of  government — the  commonwealth, 
to  give  it  its  best  name.  We  cannot  well  think  of  Greece  as  any- 
thing but  a  commonwealth.  The  kings  (basileis),  the  lords 
(anaktes),  of  the  early  time  were  poetical  shadows.  The  common- 
wealth was  the  normal  form  of  Greek  political  life.  After  every 
convulsion  of  the  State,  the  Hellenes  reverted  as  a  matter  of  course 
to  the  plane  which  seems  to  be  basic.  But  it  was  not  basic.  It  was 
the  conquest  of  ages  of  experience,  as  was  ours.  It  was  won  from 
generations  of  conflict,  as  was  ours.  Traces  of  the  old  conditions 
survive  in  the  names  and  functions  of  certain  officers  in  Athens. 
In  Sparta  the  kingship  had  a  more  or  less  unreal  life,  but  the  colo- 
nies were  all  republics,  and  the  colonies  had  the  mania  for  written 
constitutions — paper  constitutions,  we  are  beginning  to  call  them, 
and  more 's  the  pity ;  for  the  art  of  writing  belongs  to  the  religious 
sphere,  and  while  it  may  not  have  been  the  exclusive  property  of 
the  priestly  guild,  there  was  a  sacredness  about  the  written  law 
that  was  universally  recognized.  The  lawgiver  couched  his  law 
in  writing,  and  the  popular  appeal  to  'the  higher  law,'  the  un- 
written law,  the  saying,  'What  is  the  Constitution  among 
friends?' — these  are  not  cheering  symptoms  of  American  life. 
Whether  the  'boss'  who  looms  larger  and  larger  in  our  political 
life — the  'boss'  who  is  the  incorporation  of  individualism,  as 
opposed  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  commonwealth — 
shall  ripen  into  the  tyrannos  of  the  Greek  state,  remains  to  be  seen. 
What  is  well  worth  noting  is  the  Greek  horror  of  the  function 
which  has  been  transmitted  to  us  through  the  ages.  The  Greeks 
were  not  given  to  assassination  as  a  political  measure.  Now  and 
then  a  man  was  found  conveniently  dead  in  the  market  for  willow- 
wares,  now  and  then  there  was  a  judicial  murder.  But  the  tyrant 
was  an  exception.  The  tyrannicide  was  a  theme  of  eulogy  from  the 
immortal  pair  of  friends,  commemorated  in  the  scolion  of  Callis- 
tratus,  down  to  the  latest  Greek  rhetorician  of  the  imperial  time. 
'A  fine  shroud  is  the  tyrannis'  is  a  famous  saying  addressed  to  a 
famous  tyrant,  and  the  man  who  put  on  the  purple  robe  had  good 
reason  to  ask  himself  how  the  raiment  would  look  as  a  cerement. 
And  yet  the  Greek  tyrannos  at  the  beginning  was  as  harmless  a 
word  as  the  Dutch  'boss.'  The  same  jealousy  of  the  rights  of  the 
people  is  shown  by  our  English  use  of  the  word  'usurper.'     The 


250  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

danger  of  the  assumption  of  undelegated  powers  has  its  signal  in 
the  name,  and  we  Americans  as  heirs  of  the  Greek  republican  spirit 
do  well  to  watch  the  encroachments  of  executive  office.  Our  fore- 
fathers, as  we  have  seen,  studied  the  structure  of  Greek  federation. 
Our  contemporaries  on  the  other  side  are  watching  the  steps  that 
seem  to  be  leading  us  to  Caesarism.  The  benevolent  tyrant  can 
never  be  to  us  the  ideal  form  of  government.  A  safe  slavery 
{asphalos  duleuein)  is  as  abhorrent  to  us  as  it  was  to  the  Greeks. 
It  is  not  an  uncommon  thesis  that  the  human  race  was  never  happier 
than  under  the  Antonines,  and  yet  the  suppression  of  Christianity 
was  one  of  the  conditions  of  that  happiness  in  the  eyes  of  the 
philosopher  on  the  throne.  But  we  must  accept  the  dangers  and 
the  degeneracies  of  the  republic  with  its  form.  In  fact,  the  stu- 
dent of  Greek  history  is  reminded  at  every  turn  of  the  tendencies 
of  our  day,  if  dangers  and  degeneracies  are  thought  to  be  harsh 
expressions;  and  I  might  have  discharged  myself  of  the  function  I 
have  undertaken  in  this  lecture  by  a  talk  on  'Life  in  the  Time  of 
Aristophanes. '  How  Athenian  life  answers  to  ours,  I  can  illustrate 
by  my  own  experience ;  as  indeed  nearly  everything  I  have  said  in 
these  conferences,  I  have  lived.  Once  I  was  commissioned  to  give 
a  sketch  of  Aristophanes'  plays  in  half  a  page,  and  those  who  know 
Aristophanes  and  America  will  recognize  the  meaning  of  the  sum- 
mary. 'Aristophanes,'  I  said,  'Aristophanes,  an  aristocrat  by  party 
allegiance,  was  from  the  beginning  in  opposition  to  democracy  and 
progress,  to  the  elevation  of  the  masses,  to  the  career  open  to  talent, 
to  free  thought,  to  finer  art,  to  art  for  art's  sake,  to  community  of 
goods,  to  women 's  rights,  to  every  form  of  sophistic  phrase-making 
and  humanitarian  claptrap.'  The  slogans  and  counter-slogans  of 
American  life  are  all  to  be  heard  in  the  poems  of  the  bald-head 
bard.  And  Aristophanes'  picture  of  Athenian  life  is  strikingly  like 
our  own — with  its  fads,  its  fancies,  its  futilities.  French  feuille- 
tonistes  and  French  scholars  have  written  whole  books  on  Aristoph- 
anes that  are  essentially  commentaries  on  actualities,  and  Aris- 
tophanes' most  audacious  woman-play,  the  Lysistrata,  has  been 
reproduced  amid  rapturous  applause  before  a  French  audience. 

But  despite  the  license  of  the  modern  novel,  English  and  Ameri- 
can, your  lecturer  is  not  prepared  to  compare  the  seams  in  our 
social  life  with  the  seams  in  the  social  life  of  Greece.  Public  life 
offers  analogies  enough — I  will  not  say  for  warning — the  admoni- 
tions of  history,  that  so-called  'philosophy  teaching  by  examples,' 
amount  to  very  little — but  for  amusement.  There  is  hardly  a  trick 
in  modern  politics  that  cannot  be  paralleled,  if  not  in  the  verse  of 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  251 

Aristophanes,  in  the  prose  of  Greek  historians  and  orators  and 
thinkers.  Caucuses  and  rings  and  heelers  were  as  familiar  to  them 
as  to  us,  and  unfortunately  the  accuracy  of  the  description  of  the 
parasites  that  infest  the  life  of  the  commonwealth  has  not  helped 
to  extirpate  the  brood.  The  plague-bearing  mosquito  abides,  and 
has  taken  on  a  Greek  name ;  and  an  Apollo  is  needed  to  quell  the 
plague-bearing  rats  that  are  the  successors  of  the  plague-bearing 
mice  of  antiquity. 

But  I  must  not  allow  my  discourse  to  assume  the  pessimistic 
character  so  natural  to  those  whose  time  of  life  prompts  them  to 
extol  the  past  at  the  expense  of  the  present.  The  old  teacher,  once 
justly  detested,  appears  to  the  old  pupil  glorified  by  the  hues  of  his 
own  iridescent  youth,  and  the  better  days  of  the  Republic  when 
analyzed  by  the  light  of  contemporary  documents  are  not  the 
Saturnia  regna  one  fancies  them  to  have  been,  because  of  the  halo 
of  oratory  that  encircled  the  heroes  of  that  time,  in  the  days  when 
life  was  younger.  So  I  am  not  going  to  ransack  Plato's  Dialogues 
for  melancholy  pictures  of  our  present  in  order  to  reinforce  my 
parallels  of  Greek  and  American  life.  Our  ship  of  state — a  figure 
we  owe  ultimately  to  a  Greek  poet,  Alcaeus  (for  all  the  Greek  poets 
were  more  or  less  nautical,  the  Boeotian  Pindar  as  well  as  the 
islander  Bacchylides) — our  ship  of  state  has  a  strange  way  of  right- 
ing herself,  had  that  way  in  the  time  of  the  chain-box,  which  may 
be  supposed  to  symbolize  the  days  of  slavery,  and  will  continue 
to  have  it  in  these  times  of  the  water-ballast,  which  may  be  sup- 
posed to  represent  the  wave  of  prohibition.  One  danger  of  which 
one  hears  and  thinks  a  great  deal  is  the  danger  of  having  said  ship 
swamped  by  alien  passengers,  who  will  in  time  become  crew,  be- 
come officers.  Here  in  Virginia — in  the  Southern  States  gener- 
ally— the  danger  does  not  seem  imminent.  In  fact,  we  are  inviting 
foreigners  to  embark  on  our  undermanned  enterprises.  But  to  an 
old-fashioned  man  one  of  the  charms  of  a  visit  to  England  is  the 
infrequency  of  alien  names  on  the  signs  of  the  shops.  In  the  retail 
business  section  of  the  city  where  I  live,  the  English  name  is  the 
exception.  Nearly  all  the  signs  seem  to  have  been  made  in  Ger- 
many. "When  the  linguist  scans  the  roster  of  our  army  and  navy, 
he  finds  representatives  of  every  European  land — as  good  Ameri- 
cans doubtless  as  the  best,  though  the  names  bewray  the  foreign 
descent.  There  is  no  harm  in  this,  nay,  much  good  in  it.  There 
is  a  tingle  of  adventure  in  the  mingling  of  blood.  Matthew  Arnold 
has  held  forth  on  the  exceeding  preciousness  of  Celtic  blood  in 
quickening  the  sluggish  current  of  Anglo-Saxon  veins,  and  Du 


252  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

Maurier  has  insisted  humorously  on  the  importance,  if  not  the 
necessity,  of  a  dash  of  Jewish  ichor  for  the  highest  manifestation 
of  genius.  We  all  feel  that  we  can  care  for  the  natives  of  Western 
Europe.  Other  problems  are  more  serious.  A  dear  friend  of  mine, 
now  numbered  with  most  of  my  friends,  an  alumnus  of  this  univer- 
sity, used  to  insist  years  and  years  ago  with  what  was  considered 
humorous  exaggeration  on  the  danger  of  the  complete  absorption  of 
the  original  stock  of  our  population  in  the  Mongolian.  The  Chinese, 
he  maintained,  had  a  mission  analogous  to  that  of  the  Norway  rat, 
and  the  introduction  to  Virginius  Dabney's  chief  literary  per- 
formance, Don  Miff,  is  addressed  to  his  almond-eyed  descendant. 
That  was  many  years  before  statesmen  began  to  discuss  gravely  the 
Yellow  Peril. 

Now  it  is  not  my  purpose  in  these  desultory  talks  of  an  old  stu- 
dent who  has  spent  his  life  apart  from  politics  to  enter  into  the 
circle  of  fire,  as  it  ought  to  be  called,  rather  than  the  burning  ques- 
tion, of  our  relations  to  Asiatic  immigration.  I  can  only  say,  so 
far  as  the  Greek  aspect  of  the  matter  goes,  that  the  Greek  suc- 
ceeded in  unifying  and  harmonizing  a  vast  number  of  foreign  ele- 
ments. When  we  attempt  to  push  our  researches  into  pre-Hellenic 
times,  we  encounter  a  great  variety  of  strains.  The  names  of 
stream  and  mountain  give  up  their  secrets,  and  the  story  of  Greek 
cults  reveals  many  lines  of  foreign  influence  and  foreign  origin. 
Great  as  was  the  assimilative  power  of  the  Greek,  not  less  great,  it 
is  to  be  confidently  hoped,  is  the  assimilative  power  of  the  Ameri- 
can. If  we  scan  the  annals  of  Greek  literature  narrowly,  we  find 
that  some  of  the  most  characteristic  figures  are  foreigners  or  half- 
foreigners.  When  we  think  of  the  great  historians,  Thucydides 
looms  up  as  one  of  the  peaks  of  the  biceps  Parnassus,  and  Thucyd- 
ides was  only  a  semi-Greek.  The  Holkham  bust  presents  us  with 
the  features  of  an  English  gentleman,  and  I  have  heard  Percy 
Gardner,  who  believes  in  the  lessons  of  Greek  iconography,  hold 
forth  on  the  Jewish  cast  of  the  countenance  of  Zeno  the  Stoic. 
After  Alexander  the  spread  of  the  Greek  language  makes  it  hard 
to  draw  the  line  between  Greek  and  barbarian.  The  Asiatic  trans- 
lated his  name  into  Greek,  at  a  later  time  into  Graeeo-Latin.  What 
did  Lucian's  mother  call  the  little  Samosatan  who  had  to  learn 
Greek  in  his  boyhood,  as  we  have  done,  but  under  more  advan- 
tageous circumstances?  We  pedants  of  to-day  may  criticize  his 
Greek,  but  we  cannot  attain  to  his  lightness,  his  airiness ;  and  only 
the  closest  analysis  can  distinguish  the  Syrian  oil-color  from  the 
Greek  water-color.    The  domination  of  a  nationality  comes  through 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  253 

its  language.  No  truer  Frenchmen  than  the  Gallicized  Germans 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  some  of  the  chauvinistes  of  our 
times  bear  un-French  names.  And  English,  or,  if  you  choose,  the 
American  type  of  English,  is  destined  to  accomplish  the  same  end 
for  the  masses  of  foreigners  that  come  to  our  shore.  A  generation, 
a  short  time  in  the  history  of  the  race,  is  not  so  short  in  an  undula- 
tory  world  like  ours.  Things  move  more  slowly  in  Europe,  but 
even  there  the  enclave  has  to  give  way,  and  the  tide  of  the  dominant 
language  overflows  the  barriers.  Even  to-day  the  sacred  soil  of 
Attica  is  occupied  mainly  by  Albanians,  but  Albanian  must  yield 
to  Greek — and  Italian  quarters  and  Bohemian  quarters  will  not  hold 
their  own  against  the  encroachments  of  the  tide  of  American  life. 

And  this  potent  organon  of  language  is  wielded  by  a  people  at 
whose  versatility  the  European  observer  stands  aghast.  The  bar- 
riers are  to  be  broken  down,  not  only  by  the  tide  of  affairs,  but  by 
the  impetuous  winds  of  human  will — of  American  will.  Speed, 
says  Henley,  and  the  hug  of  God's  winds.  The  versatility  of  the 
Greek  was  notorious.  The  ready  shift  of  the  Greekling  under  the 
Roman  Empire  has  been  made  proverbial  by  Juvenal;  and  John- 
son, whom  no  Frenchman  loves,  whose  popularity  is  a  mystery  even 
to  such  a  sympathetic  soul  as  Taine,  has  imitated  Juvenal's  char- 
acteristic and  applied  it  to  the  French.  And  yet  it  is  a  French- 
man, as  we  shall  see,  that  has  given  most  emphatic  expression  to  the 
astonishing  versatility  of  the  American  genius.  The  conditions  of 
our  colonial  life  may  have  had  something  to  do  with  it,  but  the 
same  versatility  can  be  found  in  our  oldest  communities.  Some  of 
us  oldsters  have  seen  a  bishop  become  a  general.  Priest,  actor, 
ballet-dancer,  musical  composer,  poet,  general — such  a  combina- 
tion does  not  stagger  those  who  have  known  preacher,  lawyer, 
schoolmaster,  horse-jockey,  prize-fighter,  politician,  rolled  into 
one — I  beg  pardon,  politician  means  all  that.  True,  in  serious 
matters  like  art,  the  Greek  did  not  move  so  readily  from  one 
province  to  another.  In  fact,  the  limitation  of  the  prose  writer  to 
prose,  of  the  poet  to  poetry,  and  so  on  along  all  the  lines  of  literary 
effort,  is  one  of  the  most  striking  characteristics  of  the  Greek.  But 
in  the  various  demands  of  practical  life,  the  life  which  they  saw 
so  steadily  and  lived  so  whole,  if  I  may  be  allowed  to  adapt  a 
famous  line,  your  Greek  was  always  equal  to  the  occasion,  and  this 
mobility  shows  itself  also  in  the  sphere  of  morals,  and  here  the 
American  is  quite  his  equal.  Max  O  'Rell  attributed  to  our  English 
blood  the  rapid  passage  from  poker  to  prayers,  from  three-card 
monte  to  four-part  psalmody.    True,  M.  Blouet  says  it  is  our  Eng- 


254  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

lish  blood.  It  is,  I  suppose,  that  'spleen'  by  which  Frenchmen 
explain  everything.  But  if  it  is  English,  it  is  enhanced  by  our 
intense  vitality.  Not  English,  but  Greek,  is  the  ready  receptivity 
of  foreign  ideas.  In  this  respect  the  Channel  is  broader  than  the 
Atlantic.  Nay,  there  is  much  that  crosses  the  water  to  us,  and 
then  recrosses  it  to  our  English  cousins.  The  American  scholar 
is  often  more  German  than  the  German.  Yes!  we  are  versatile, 
and  versatile  to  a  purpose.  What  does  a  man  like  Hopkinson  Smith 
care  for  the  old  Greek  sneer  that  has  its  echo  in  the  English  say- 
ing 'Jack  of  all  trades  and  master  of  none'?  What  your  own 
Professor  Humphreys,  with  his  exact  command  of  all  the  canons  of 
literature  and  science  ?  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  advance  of  spe- 
cialization will  not  rob  us  of  the  Greek  readiness  to  turn  our  hands 
to  anything  that  lies  near.  It  is  the  curse  of  modern  machinery 
that  it  reduces  the  human  being  to  a  mere  feeder  of  a  monster  of 
cogs  and  belts.  'Advance,'  did  I  say?  Specialization  is  as  old  as 
Jubal  and  Tubal-cain.  The  Egyptians  were  noted  specialists; 
there  were  doctors  for  every  part  of  the  body,  and  Jack  the  Ripper 
was  a  specialist  under  the  name  of  the  paraschistes,  or  side-splitter, 
a  name  that  we  attach  to  a  very  different  function  from  that  of  the 
man  who  opened  bodies  for  embalming.  There  were  specialists  in 
Greece,  specialists  in  surgery,  manufacturers  of  hair-nets  for 
women;  specialists  in  Rome,  who  made  it  their  business  to  efface 
the  scars  of  branded  slaves  that  had  risen  in  the  world.  But  the 
Greek  note  is  universality,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  we  shall  never 
lose  that  Greek  note,  which  is  the  admiration  of  all  who  come  to  our 
shores,  and  which  is  so  important  a  factor  in  our  subjugation  of 
this  vast  continent. 

But  before  leaving  this  part  of  my  theme — the  likeness  of  Greek 
to  American,  of  American  to  Greek — I  must  not  omit  one  trait 
that  the  genuine  American  and  genuine  Greek  have  in  common, 
although  I  may  be  behind  the  times  in  asserting  it,  a  trait  that 
belongs  to  the  democratic  character  of  both  nationalities.  It  is  not 
freedom  of  speech,  that  parrhesia  of  which  the  Greeks  were  so 
proud.  A  certain  bluntness  is  found  under  all  forms  of  govern- 
ment, but  it  is  a  subtler  freedom  than  that — it  is  freedom  from 
snobbery.  Flatterers  and  parasites  the  Greeks  had  with  them 
always.  They  were  conspicuous  in  the  decline  of  the  nationality,  and 
Plutarch  has  an  entertaining  essay  on  the  way  to  distinguish  the 
flatterer  from  the  friend.  But  they  were  scarcely  less  conspicuous 
in  an  earlier  period,  and  Ribbeck's  delightful  study  of  the  'Colax' 
claims  for  the  parasite  a  semi-religious  origin.    But  a  'snob'  the 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  255 

Greek  never  was,  and  the  snobbery  of  the  American  is  an  imported 
snobbery.  The  Booh  of  Snobs  could  not  have  been  written  by  an 
American  of  the  old  type.  That  the  imported  disease,  like  the 
English  sparrow,  has  increased  greatly  and  multiplied  in  this 
country  the  satirist  may  maintain.  But  the  salt  water  of  the 
herring-pond  seems  to  have  killed  the  germ  in  our  American  pro- 
genitors. True,  it  is  associated  with  high  things  and  high  words, 
but  it  spoils  high  things  and  high  words,  and  the  man  of  old  Ameri- 
can stock  prefers  'faith'  to  'loyalty'  and  'obedience'  to  'homage.' 
Snobbish  commentators  cannot  understand  how  Pindar  could  have 
called  Hiero  'friend';  the  Italian  student  of  the  poet  compares  the 
Theban  singer  to  a  Knight  of  the  Order  of  the  Annunziata,  who  is 
the  peer  of  his  sovereign.  True  Americans  are  all  Knights  of  a 
spiritual  Annunziata  order. 

I  have  referred  to  Professor  Brander  Matthews  as  the  great 
champion  of  Americanism  in  language  and  literature  and  life,  and 
I  have  been  reading  a  discourse  of  his  pronounced  some  years  ago, 
in  which  he  repelled  the  charge  that  we  Americans  are  a  people 
terribly  practical,  systematically  hostile  to  all  idealism.  And  it  is 
true  that,  if  there  is  any  adjective  that  fits  an  American  in  Euro- 
pean eyes,  it  is  'practical.'  To  be  an  American  is  to  be  practical. 
A  German  grammarian  desirous  of  vindicating  his  method  to  his 
countrymen  emphasized  the  fact  that  it  had  been  adopted  by  a 
practical  American,  and  that  practical  American  is  the  man  who 
is  addressing  you,  a  man  who  was  at  that  time  thought  by  his 
own  countrymen  to  be  steeped  in  German  idealism.  I  have  there- 
fore been  called  practical  simply  because  I  am  an  American,  just 
as  I  have  been  called  a  Yankee  by  a  French  critic,  because  I  am 
an  American.  True,  mistakes  enough  may  be  made  in  the  appli- 
cation of  these  sweeping  characteristics  of  a  nationality,  and  I 
remember  that  Robert  Louis  Stevenson  records  somewhere  how 
he  picked  out  in  a  New  York  hotel  a  cadaverous,  omnivorous  indi- 
vidual as  a  typical  American,  who  turned  out  to  be  a  genuine 
Briton.  Whatever  mistakes  may  be  made  in  applying  these  char- 
acteristics to  this  man  and  that,  there  can  be  no  mistake  about  the 
practical  feature  of  our  American  people.  There  are  those  that 
have  denied  us  energy,  and  it  has  been  maintained,  perhaps  by  way 
of  paradox,  that  your  typical  American  spends  his  time  in  a  rocking- 
chair  on  a  back  porch,  whittling  sticks  and  exemplifying  his 
national  indolence  by  the  invention  of  labor-saving  machines.  Noth- 
ing could  be  more  'practical'  than  the  labor-saving  machine,  as 
nothing  can  be  more  audacious  than  the  American  protest,  futile 


256  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

as  it  is,  against  the  primal  doom  of  toil.  But  practical  we  are,  and 
practical  was  the  Greek.  The  most  artistic  of  races  was  at  the 
same  time  the  most  bent  on  getting  results,  and  the  latest  phase 
of  philosophic  thought,  pragmatism,  most  effectively  preached  by 
an  American,  is  nothing  more  than  the  interpretation  of  a  Greek 
word.  The  sphere  of  human  work  was  divided  by  the  Greek  into 
zones  of  artistic  creation  and  practical  efficiency,  poiein  and  prat- 
tein.  Pratt ein  encroached  more  and  more  on  poiein,  but  poiein  held 
its  own  in  so  far  as  it  gave  the  life  of  art  to  prattein.  "When  Horace 
put  utile  before  dulci,  he  was  following  the  Greek  order — though 
the  Greek  way  of  mixing  liquors  differed  in  different  ages,  first  wine 
on  water,  then  water  on  wine.  We  do  not  like  to  think  that  Shake- 
speare was  so  practical  a  man  as  the  record  shows  him  to  have 
been,  that  he  valued  so  highly  the  material  results  of  his  work  as 
a  dramatist  and  an  actor — but  that  did  not  render  the  work  itself 
less  idealistic.  But  the  Greek  went  further  than  that.  The  artistic 
work  itself  must  be  practical.  Every  tool  must  follow  the  lines 
of  greatest  efficiency.  Poetry  was  valuable  for  its  moral  lessons. 
Philosophy  was  not  mere  speculation,  it  was  largely  ethics.  The 
Greek  found  himself  in  Socrates,  and  Plato  was  in  the  first  line  a 
preacher  of  righteousness.  When  Grote,  the  friend  of  John  Stuart 
Mill,  was  looking  for  a  motto  to  be  prefixed  to  his  work  on  Plato, 
he  had  no  difficulty  in  finding  one  to  rejoice  the  heart  of  the  utili- 
tarian. The  glorification  of  money  as  the  ultimate  expression  of 
achievement  was  ancient  Greek  as  it  is  modern  American.  It  was 
said  of  Euripides  that  he  hated  women  so  because  he  loved  them 
so,  and  all  the  teachings  of  Cynic  and  Stoic — all  the  preachments 
against  the  love  of  money,  from  the  answer  of  the  Pythia  to  Sparta 
down  to  the  present  day  with  its  praise  of  the  simple  life — only  show 
that  human  nature  changes  not,  and  the  Greek  and  the  American 
are  advanced  types  of  humanity.  'Money  talks'  is  an  American 
saying.  The  brazen  tongue  must  wag  in  a  golden  mouth.  'Money, 
money  is  the  man,'  is  an  ancient  saying  quoted  by  the  loftiest  of 
Greek  poets;  quoted,  it  is  true,  in  protest  against  the  domination 
of  filthy  lucre ;  but  we,  who  live  in  a  plutocracy,  recognize  the  voice 
of  the  people.  Obolus  diabolus  is  the  title  of  one  of  the  sermons 
preached  by  an  old  Augustin  friar,  Abraham  a  Sancta  Clara,  and 
Greek  and  American  alike  are  not  averse  from  this  form  of  devil- 
worship. 

I  am  not  at  the  end  of  my  analogies.  They  come  up  on  every 
side,  at  the  bidding  of  fancy,  at  the  bidding  of  experience;  but  I 
am  nearing  the  limit  of  my  time,  and  this  talk — alas!  we  have  no 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  257 

equivalent  for  the  French  causerie — must  come  to  a  close  in  a  few 
minutes.  So  far  as  there  is  any  coherence  in  what  I  have  said,  I 
have  tried  to  illustrate,  or  at  any  rate  to  point  out,  certain  resem- 
blances between  Greek  and  American  life  and  character.  I  have 
not  even  attempted  to  be  systematic.  After  an  inordinately  long 
introduction  I  dwelt — or  rather  lighted,  for  I  have  not  dwelt  on 
anything — I  touched  on  American  and  Greek  surroundings,  Ameri- 
can and  Greek  position  in  time,  the  common  republican  basis  of  the 
American  and  Greek  state,  the  assimilative  power  of  both  nation- 
alities, the  versatility  and  practicality  of  Greek  and  American. 
But  concrete  examples  would  be  at  once  more  interesting  and  con- 
vincing than  analysis,  and  analogies  are  easily  made,  easily  drawn, 
it  may  be  said,  and  as  easily  unmade,  as  easily  wiped  out.  What 
one  sees  in  history  is  often  nothing  more  than  the  projection  of  the 
individuality  of  the  beholder.  "We  peer  into  the  open  eye  to  see 
our  own  image.  One  statesman  reads  Plato,  and  gathers  from 
Republic  and  Laws  lessons  of  momentous  importance  for  the  con- 
duct of  the  commonwealth.  Another  reads  Plato,  and  vows  that 
he  has  carried  away  nothing  except  Eryximachus'  remedy  for 
hiccups,  so  dramatically  introduced  in  the  Symposium.  And  when 
analogy  ventures  into  the  domain  of  prophecy — we  all  know  how 
the  wise  man  becomes  the  wiseacre;  and  the  example  of  Mr.  Free- 
man, who  foresaw  the  dissolution  of  the  great  American  common- 
wealth prefigured  in  the  fate  of  the  Achaean  League,  is  ever  be- 
fore the  student  of  our  history.  The  end  has  been  far  other  than 
was  dreamed  of  by  the  philosophizing  historian.  The  petty  states 
of  Greece  were  swept  into  the  current  of  the  Roman  Empire,  a 
current  that  came  from  without.  The  attitude  of  the  Roman  to 
the  Greek  was  that  of  contemptuous  tolerance,  not  of  half-wonder- 
ing hatred.  Consolidation,  fusion,  domination,  these  are  the  Ameri- 
can processes  of  which  Greece  knew  nothing.  Greece  was,  after  all, 
a  spiritual  power,  and  the  lessons  that  we  are  to  learn  come  from 
Rome,  as  I  have  already  hinted — Rome,  once  etymologized  as  the 
Greek  rhome,  'strength,'  anon  as  the  English  'stream.'  And  so 
we  come  back  to  the  ship  of  state,  which  the  Greek  poet  launched 
so  many  centuries  ago.  A  mighty  stream  is  this  on  which  you  and 
I  are  borne  as  part  of  a  proud  fleet.  But  there  were  times  when  the 
current  meant  wreckage;  and  I  turn  my  eyes  from  the  days  of 
danger  and  distress,  too  real  to  me  still  for  indulgence  in  fanciful 
historical  parallels. 

My  plea  has  been  for  the  vitality  of  the  studies  to  which  I  have 
been  addicted,  and  as  those  studies  have  been  part  of  my  own  life — 


258  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

not  simply  a  meros  but  a  melos — I  have  never  disentwined  the 
thews  and  sinews  that  have  kept  me  going  after  a  fashion  until  now. 
My  Greek  study  has  not  simply  been  a  marginal  note  on  my  Ameri- 
can life,  and  vice  versa.  My  life  has  been  written  bustrophedon 
fashion,  and  as  I  turn  the  furrow,  the  Greek  line  can't  be  dis- 
tinguished from  the  American.  A  Southerner,  I  shared  the  for- 
tunes of  my  people  in  the  Civil  War,  but  whether  on  the  edge  of 
battle  in  the  field  or  in  the  vise  of  penury  at  home,  my  thoughts 
were  with  those  who  registered  the  experiences  of  the  Pelopon- 
nesian  war,  with  Thueydides  and  Aristophanes.  But  I  am  sure 
it  will  be  a  relief  to  this  personal  tone  if  I  can  turn  on  the  phono- 
graph and  introduce  a  new  speaker  on  the  subject  I  have  tried  to 
sketch.  This  time  I  will  call  on  a  modern  Greek  to  tell  you  what 
he  thinks  of  Hellenism  and  Americanism,  of  the  relation  of  Hellas 
to  Hesperia. 

The  modern  Greek,  whatever  may  be  said  about  his  racial  affini- 
ties with  the  ancient  Greek,  commends  himself  to  our  affection  and 
regard  by  his  passionate  identification  of  the  Hellenes  that  now  are 
with  the  Hellenes  that  once  were.  It  is  all  living  Greece  to  him. 
Hellenism  is  his  watchword,  and  not  un-Greek  is  the  eager  appro- 
priation of  all  that  modern  civilization  offers.  One  is  constantly 
reminded  of  agencies  that  were  set  to  work  seventy  or  eighty  years 
ago,  such  as  the  Society  for  the  Diffusion  of  Useful  Knowledge,  to 
which  we  owe  Miiller's  History  of  Greek  Literature — a  book  that 
can  never  become  obsolete.  A  similar  society  is  in  active  opera- 
tion in  Greece,  and  one  of  the  prime  movers  was  (I  am  sorry  to 
say  was)  my  friend,  that  finest  type  of  the  modern  Greek,  Dimi- 
trios  Bikelas,  the  famous  author  of  Loukis  Laras,  a  novel  that  has 
been  translated  into  almost  every  European  tongue.  The  name  of 
the  series  may  be  roughly  rendered  Library  of  Useful  Knowledge, 
and  as  I  was  meditating  the  theme  of  my  present  lecture,  I  came 
across  the  number  that  deals  with  America.  I  am  rather  fond  of 
reading  books  that  depict  American  life  from  the  point  of  view  of 
foreigners,  and  I  had  just  been  reading  a  series  of  articles  in  which 
a  modern  Greek  immigrant  expresses  his  astonishment  at  the  cheap- 
ness of  American  viands  and  the  extravagant  charges  of  American 
bootblacks.  So  I  turned,  not  without  interest,  to  what  our  modern 
Hellene  had  to  say  about  the  modern  Hesperia,  and  I  was  still  more 
interested  to  find  that  the  concluding  pages  of  the  booklet  were 
given  up  to  a  somewhat  elaborate  parallelism  of  Hellenism  and 
Americanism.  Americanism,  the  author  maintains,  is  really  a  re- 
vival of  Hellenism,  and  the  Americanization  of  the  world,  which  he 


AMERICANISM  AND  HELLENISM  259 

seems  to  consider  inevitable,  is  really  carrying  on  the  good  work 
begun  by  Alexander.  I  wish  I  had  space  to  give  in  detail  his  list 
of  analogues,  his  vindication  of  American  society,  as  based  on  the 
soundest  ethical,  hygienic,  and  economic  principles.  Some  of  these 
analogues  I  am  afraid  you  would  consider  fanciful,  some  that  are 
true  in  principle  are  hardly  borne  out  by  the  actual  facts.  The 
ancient  Spartans,  says  our  author,  used  to  throw  into  the  ravine 
called  Caiadas  all  defective  infants — a  proceeding  against  which 
the  eulogists  of  Christianity  were  wont  to  declaim  with  intense 
abhorrence.  Analogous  to  this,  he  thinks,  is  the  restriction  of  immi- 
gration to  those  who  are  physically  fit  for  the  work  of  life.  The 
modern  American,  he  goes  on  to  say,  has  the  Greek  passion  for 
physical  perfection.  The  America  of  to-day,  like  the  Greece  of 
yore,  reposes  on  democratic  principles.  Each  man  is  master  of  his 
own  fate,  and  our  modern  Greek  seems  to  believe  in  presidential 
potentialities  as  well  as  presidential  possibilities  for  every  Ameri- 
can schoolboy.  It  is  indeed  very  interesting  to  see  how  our  generous 
encomiast  accepts  legislation  as  realization,  how  he  hails  the  preach- 
ments of  divines  and  lecturers  as  an  assurance  of  prophecies  ful- 
filled. '  To  will  perfection, '  he  seems  to  think,  '  is  the  norm  of  man, ' 
and  he  is  not  so  far  wrong.  We  are  as  our  ideals.  Marriage  is  to 
be  forbidden  to  those  who  are  physically  and  mentally  unfit  for  the 
connubial  relation,  and  the  American  child  is  to  be  the  most  per- 
fect product  of  the  age.  Oddly  enough,  he  does  not  count  the 
facility  of  divorce  as  an  evidence  of  our  readiness  to  multiply 
experiments  in  that  direction.  The  crowning  glory  of  American- 
ism, he  declares,  is  the  American  woman.  The  more  American 
women  married  to  Europeans,  the  better  for  the  European  races. 
The  Lacedaemonian  women  in  antiquity  were  in  great  demand  as 
nurses.  The  American  woman  ought  to  be  in  great  demand  as  a 
wife — quite  apart,  he  takes  care  to  add,  from  the  substantial  dowry 
so  many  of  them  bring  to  the  common  stock.  America  makes  for 
life,  for  progress.  The  Americanization  of  Europe  is  inevitable — 
we  see  it  in  every  port,  in  every  capital  of  Europe — and  moving  as 
it  does  on  Hellenic  lines,  it  is  a  blessing  to  the  world  as  was  the 
Hellenization  of  the  Orient  of  old.  All  this  is  rather  amusing  than 
convincing,  and  yet  there  is  enough  sober  truth  behind  the  smiling 
sophistry  to  warrant  the  citation  here  as  an  envoi  to  my  own  analo- 
gies, which,  I  trust,  are  at  least  a  little  less  fanciful  than  those  of 
my  Athenian  colleague. 

And  now  as  I  am  about  to  close  this  lecture,  it  occurs  to  me  that 
I  have  omitted  one  striking  trait  of  the  Greek  character,  which  is 


260  BASIL  L.  GILDERSLEEVE 

also  a  marked  feature  of  our  own  nationality.  Ready  wit,  audacity, 
resourcefulness,  practicality,  all  these  we  have  in  common  with  the 
Greeks.  We  are  versatile  as  they  were,  we  moralize  as  they  moral- 
ized, Franklin  is  as  Theognis,  but  these  are  not  necessarily  amiable 
ways,  and  I  am  going  to  take  refuge  in  that  delightful  tolerance  for 
which  Matthew  Arnold  could  find  no  adequate  translation,  because 
he  thought  that  epieikeia  was  a  national  Greek  virtue.  He  made 
a  shift  of  rendering  it  into  English  by  'sweet  reasonableness';  and 
it  is  this  'sweet  reasonableness' — this  readiness  to  put  up  with 
things,  this  acceptance  of  the  situation,  this  large  allowance  for 
individual  failings,  this  good  humor  in  the  crowded  mart  of  life,  this 
epieikeia  which  some  consider  the  bane  of  our  politics — it  is  this 
epieikeia,  to  which  I  make  my  final  appeal. 


XIX 

PAGANISM 1 
By  Ernest  Renan 

Of  all  the  religions  that  have  been  professed  by  civilized  peoples, 
that  of  the  Greeks  is  the  least  precise  and  the  least  settled.  The 
Pelasgic  cults  would  seem  to  have  been  in  general  barbarous  and 
uncouth.  It  is  surprising  that  the  people  with  whom  the  typical 
civilization  was  for  the  first  time  completely  realized  should  have 
long  remained,  in  respect  to  religion,  so  far  inferior,  I  do  not  say 
merely  to  the  Semitic  nations,  who  were,  in  antiquity,  superior  in 
point  of  religion  to  the  Indo-European  peoples,  but  to  more  than 
one  branch  of  the  Indo-Europeans — for  example,  the  Indian,  the 
Persian,  and  the  Phrygian.  The  very  great  difficulty  encountered 
in  studying  Greek  mythology  arises  just  from  this  quality  of  imper- 
fection in  dogma.  The  ancient  Greeks  had  no  well-determined  rule 
of  faith,  and  their  religion,  charming  when  taken  as  poetry,  is,  when 
viewed  according  to  our  theological  ideas,  a  mere  mass  of  contra- 
dictory fables,  the  true  meaning  of  which  it  is  very  hard  to  unravel. 
The  new  school  properly  refrains  from  seeking  there  for  anything 
that  resembles  profound  mysteries  and  an  exalted  symbolism.  We 
have  to  deal  with  confused  memories  of  an  early  worship  of  nature, 
with  traces  of  primitive  sensations  which  took  on  bodily  form  and 
became  personages,  these  personages  being  supplied  with  adventures 
by  means  of  plays  upon  words  and,  if  I  dare  say  so,  cock-and-bull 
stories,  like  those  that  are  hatched  in  the  imagination  of  a  child.  A 
people  at  once  lively,  mobile,  and  forgetful,  composed  the  exquisite 
framework  of  these  fables,  which,  embellished  by  poetry  and  art, 
became  a  sort  of  mythology  for  all  the  peoples  of  the  Graeco-Roman 
world.  — >. 

Greece  never  had  a  sacred  book,  nor  a  symbol,  nor  councils,  nor-- 

[i  Translated  from  Nouvelles  fitudes  d'Histoire  Beligieuse  (pp.  14-30). 
Kenan's  essay  on  Paganisme  (pp.  13-30)  is  a  review  of  Alfred  Maury's 
Histoire  des  Religions  de  la  Grice  Antique,  Vol.  1  (1857).  A  paragraph  at 
the  beginning,  a  part  of  the  fourth,  and  a  part  of  the  closing  paragraph  have 
been  omitted  in  translation. — Editor.] 


262  ERNEST  RENAN 

a  priesthood  organized  for  the  preservation  of  dogmas.  The  poets 
and  artists  were  her  true  theologians ;  what  to  think  of  the  different 
divinities  was  left  pretty  much  to  the  individual  and  his  arbitrary 
conceptions.  Hence  came  that  marvelous  freedom  which  allowed 
the  Greek  spirit  to  move  spontaneously  in  every  direction  without 
encountering  anywhere  about  it  the  restraint  of  a  revealed  text; 
and  hence  also  for  art,  untrammeled  by  theological  control,  and  pos- 
sessing the  right  to  create  at  its  own  pleasure  the  types  of  the  divine 
world,  there  were  incomparable  advantages ;  but  hence,  too,  for  reli- 
gion, a  vexatious  uncertainty  which  permitted  the  cult  to  float  at 
the  mercy  of  every  wind,  gave  boundless  scope  to  the  caprices  of 
individual  devotion,  and  finally  produced  an  incredible  flood  of 
folly  and  nonsense.  In  this  chaos  of  contradictory  fables  there  is 
nothing  more  difficult  than  to  seize  upon  the  true  essence  of  the 
Hellenic  religion — I  mean  to .  say,  the  nourishment  it  furnished  to 
the  craving  for  a  belief.  This  is  what  Ms  Maury  has  tried  to  dis- 
cover. The  interpretation  of  particular  myths  occupies  him  less 
than  the  questions  relative  to  worship,  morals,  and  the  forms  under 
which  the  sentiment  of  piety  manifested  itself  in  paganism.  .  .  . 

Is  there,  actually,  a  more  striking  phenomenon  than  the  dis- 
covery, in  the  ancient  religions  of  the  common  race  which  has 
created  civilization  from  the  Island  of  Ceylon  to  Iceland,  of  the 
same  resemblance  as  in  their  languages  ?  If  any  proposition  at  the 
present  day  has  been  demonstrated,  it  is  that  the  most  diverse 
peoples  of  that  race — Hindus,'  Persians,  Armenians,  Phrygians, 
Greek,  Italiots,  the  Germanic,  Slavonic,  and  even  Celtic  peoples — 
originally  had  a  single  cult  consisting  in  the  adoration  of  the  forces 
of  nature,  regarded  as  free  agents.  The  systems  which  sought  to 
explain  Greek  mythology  by  borrowings  from  Egypt,  Judea,  Phoe- 
nicia, by  a  learned  symbolism,  by  an  alteration  of  the  truths  of 
revelation — all  these  systems,  I  affirm,  must  be  abandoned.2  Greek 
mythology  is  one  of  the  forms  in  which  we  find  reclothed,  in  the 
course  of  time,  and  under  the  sway  of  local  conditions,  that  natural- 
ism, the  earliest  and  the  purest  type  of  which  is  presented  by  the 
Vedas.  Doubtless  the  religious  heritage  common  to  all  the  Indo- 
European  peoples  was  very  inconsiderable,  if  we  regard  only  the 
number  and  philosophic  value  of  the  ideas  included ;  doubtless  each 
several  branch  of  the  race  as  a  whole  developed  the  primitive  sub- 

2  Certainly  the  progress  of  investigation  leads  one  to  regard  the  mythological 
borrowings  by  Greece  from  Phoenicia  as  having  been  considerable;  still,  the 
primitive  Aryan  nucleus  remains,  in  Greek  religion  as  a  whole,  the  primary 
generating  force. 


PAGANISM  263 

stance  in  a  self-adapting  fashion,  and  Greece  in  particular  trans- 
formed it  in  accordance  with  her  own  plastic  genius  and  delicate 
taste;  yet  the  basis  is  everywhere  the  same;  wherever  the  Indo- 
European  race  has  preserved  any  memory  of  its  ancient  religious 
condition,  one  catches  the  echo,  more  or  less  faint,  of  sensations 
revealing  to  man  a  divine  world  concealed  behind  nature. 

How  did  the  human  mind  derive  a  vast  assemblage  of  fables  from 
this  naturalism,  in  appearance  so  simple?  How  did  it  transform 
physical  elements  into  persons,  and  the  myths  concerning  them  into 
adventures  whose  connection  with  the  original  meaning  of  the 
myths  it  is  often  impossible  to  recognize  ?  Here  is  the  point  where 
modern  criticism  has  frequently  shown  sagacity  in  its  glimpses  of 
the  truth.  Sometimes  the  reason  for  these  metamorphoses  is  per- 
fectly obvious;  for  example,  when  the  fire  on  the  domestic  hearth 
(hestia  or  vesta)  and  the  subterranean  fire  (vulcanus)  become  two 
divinities — the  first,  chaste  and  venerable,  the  second,  mournful  and 
laborious.  At  other  times,  the  freaks  of  popular  imagination,  and 
the  impossibility  of  retaining  the  significance  of  a  legend  through 
successive  generations,  brought  about  singular  deviations.  Pro- 
duced by  an  early  age,  when  man  and  nature  were  hardly  separated 
and  possessed  so  to  speak  but  a  single  consciousness,  the  naive 
dogmas  of  the  primitive  religion  shortly  ceased  to  be  understood, 
and  sank  to  the  level  of  anecdote  and  romance. 

I  shall  cite  but  one  example.  The  calm  and  voluptuous  feeling 
awakened  by  the  first  rain's  of  spring  inspired  the  ancestors  of  the 
Indo-European  race  with  an  idea  which  is  to  be  discovered  in  the 
mythologies  of  virtually  all  their  descendants.  The  moisture  fer- 
tilizing the  soil  was  conceived  of  as  the  mysterious  union  of  two 
divinities,  the  Sky  and  the  Earth.  '  The  pure  heaven, '  says  Aeschy- 
lus, an  excellent  interpreter  of  the  old  fables,  'desires  to  penetrate 
the  earth ;  the  earth,  on  its  part,  aspires  to  the  union ;  the  rain  fall- 
ing from  the  amorous  heaven  impregnates  the  earth,  and  the  latter 
brings  forth  for  mortals  pasturage  for  the  flocks  and  the  gifts  of 
Ceres. '  As  the  imagination  of  primitive  peoples  .'always  confounded 
a  sensation  with  the  accompanying  circumstances,  that  bird  whose 
song  mingles  with  the  showers  of  spring,  the  cuckoo,  became 
involved  in  the  myth,  and  its  soft  and  melancholy  cry  represented 
to  the  simple  men  of  the  earliest  period  the  amorous  sighs  of  the 
divine  couple.  Now  would  you  like  to  know  what-  happened  to  this 
myth,  at  once  so  fascinating  and  impressive,  when  interpreted  by  a 
less  delicate  age?  It  became  an  equivocal  tale,  over  which  Aris- 
tophanes made  merry,  to  which  the  people  added  ridiculous  details, 


264  ERNEST  RENAN 

and  which  gave  occasion  to  gross  practices.  It  was  said  that  one 
cold  day  while  Juno  was  on  Mount  Thornax,  a  benumbed  cuckoo 
sought  refuge  in  her  bosom.  The  goddess  took  pity  on  the  bird; 
but  scarcely  had  she  given  it  shelter  when  Jupiter  resumed  his 
natural  form.  People  added  that  when  the  goddess  resisted,  Jupi- 
ter was  forced  to  promise  to  marry  her. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  how  very  frequent  such  trans- 
formations of  stories  were  in  antiquity.  From  one  end  to  the  other, 
Greek  mythology  is  simply  a  vast  misinterpretation,  by  virtue  of 
which  the  divinities  that  had  proceeded  from  the  rapture  of  the  man 
of  the  early  ages,  face  to  face  with  nature,  became  human.  The 
same  thing  occurred  in  India,  and  has  continued  down  to  our  own 
day.  Smallpox  and  cholera  are  there  personified.  The  legends  of 
the  major  divinities  constantly  undergo,  if  not  additions,  at  all 
events  notable  alterations  in  form.  And  yet  nowhere  else  is  the 
impress  of  the  primitive  nature-worship  so  clearly  marked  as  in 
the  religion  of  the  Brahmins.  It  is  to  the  fire,  under  its  name  as  an 
element  (agni,  ignis),  that  the  hymns  of  the  Veda  are  addressed. 
The  devas  themselves  (divi,  dii)  were  not  born  of  a  process  of  meta- 
physical reasoning,  analogous  to  that  by  which  monotheism  deduces 
the  necessity  of  a  supreme  cause.  They  are  one  of  those  classes  of 
aerial  beings  with  which  the  primitive  Aryan  peopled  all  nature, 
beings  conceived  of  as  in  many  respects  inferior  to  man. 

It  was  in  the  worship  of  heroes  especially  that  the  variations  of 
religious  sentiment  found  opportunity  for  development,  and  led 
to  singular  results.  The  heroes  are  not,  as  was  long  believed,  human 
beings  deified ;  they  are  of  the  same  origin  as  the  gods.  In  nearly 
every  case  one  finds  a  god  and  a  hero  answering  to  the  same  alle- 
gory, and  representing,  under  two  distinct  figures,  a  single  phenom- 
enon, a  single  star,  a  single  meteor.  The  hero  is  thus  the  double 
of  a  divinity,  the  pale  reflection,  a  sort  of  parhelion,  of  the  efful- 
gence of  a  major  deity.  True  it  is,  that  in  comparing  the  legend  of 
the  god  with  that  of  the  hero,  one  commonly  finds  the  latter  to  be 
far  more  copious.  But  the  cause  of  this  difference  is  quite  simple. 
The  hero,  being  regarded  as  a  man,  and,  in  accordance  with  popular 
opinion,  having  left  traces  of  his  existence  here  below,  necessarily 
obtained  a  greater  vogue,  and  made  more  of  an  appeal  to  the  senti- 
ments of  the  crowd ;  just  as  the  saints,  in  the  less  enlightened  parts 
of  Christendom,  occupy  a  much  more  important  place  than  God 
himself,  precisely  because,  being  inferior,  they  are  not  separated 
from  mortals  by  so  insuperable  a  distance. 

It  was  above  all  at  the  time  when  people  affected  to  derive  moral 


/ 


PAGANISM  265 

instruction  from  the  pagan  religion  that  the  heroes  gained  in  impor- 
tance and  popularity.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  they  actually  lent 
themselves  far  better  than  the  gods  to  that  kind  of  teaching.  The 
adventures  in  which  their  valor,  subjected  to  severe  tests,  was 
seen  at  times  to  yield,  only  to  reassert  itself,  were  set  forth  by  the 
poets  as  models  of  resignation  and  courage.  Hercules  in  particular 
was  made  use  of  in  this  way  by  those  whom  one  might  call  the 
preachers  of  paganism.  Hercules,  according  to  a  very  probable 
hypothesis  which  the  demonstrations  of  M.  Maury  raise  to  the  level 
of  certitude,  was  an  ancient  divinity  of  the  air  (Hera-cles)  whose 
cult,  in  the  hands  of  the  warlike  race  of  the  Dorians,  took  on  an 
altogether  heroic  character  which  was  transformed,  under  the  influ- 
ence of  the  poets  and  philosophers,  into  a  moral  allegory  pure  and 
simple.  This  demi-god,  arising  like  all  the  other  Hellenic  types  of 
divinity  from  a  personification  of  the  elements,  but  rendered  singu- 
larly uncouth  through  confusion  with  the  Tyrian  Melkarth,  finally 
became  the  ideal  of  human  perfection — a  kind  of  saint  who  was 
furnished  with  an  edifying  biography,  in  connection  with  whom  an 
attempt  was  made  to  awaken  in  men's  souls  a  sense  of  duty.  This 
may  appear  incredible;  but  India  supplies  us  with  more  than  one 
example  of  analogous  transformations.  Vishnu,  who  plays  in 
Hindu  mythology  a  part  similar  to  that  of  Hercules,  was  in  the 
beginning  only  a  personification  of  the  air,  an  image  of  the  celestial 
vault  illuminated  by  the  sun.  Subsequently  there  were  attributed 
to  him  labors  for  the  most  part  derived  from  the  benefits  conferred 
by  the  sun,  and  he  became  a  sort  of  redeemer,  devoting  himself  to 
the  salvation  of  the  human  race. 

How  could  intuitions  so  simple,  corresponding  in  their  origin  to 
nothing  philosophical  or  ethical,  satisfy  during  so  many  centuries, 
and  even  in  an  epoch  of  splendid  civilization,  the  religious  needs 
of  the  most  refined  races?  And  at  the  present  day,  how  does  it 
come  that  a  country  like  India,  smitten,  it  is  true,  with  an  age-long 
decadence,  but  one  where  human  thought  nevertheless  has  bestirred 
itself  with  much  force  and  originality,  remains  obstinately  attached, 
in  spite  of  preaching  by  Christian  and  Moslem,  to  a  religious  system 
which,  it  would  seem,  should  not  have  survived  beyond  the  earliest 
days  of  the  human  race  ?  It  is  custom  alone,  the  influence  of  which 
is  above  all  decisive  in  matters  of  religion,  that  will  serve  to  explain 
so  extraordinary  a  phenomenon.  Handed  down  by  tradition,  these 
fables,  in  spite  of  their  absurdity,  appealed  to  the  imagination  and 
the  heart  because  they  were  old.  Religious  sentiment  is  prone  to 
attach  itself  to  an  ancient  dogma  even  when  it  sees  this  dogma 


266  ERNEST  RENAN 

vanquished  and  left  behind.  Not  far  from  a  little  village  of  Brit- 
tany where  I  spent  my  childhood,  there  was  a  chapel  sacred  to  the 
Virgin,  containing  a  Madonna  that  was  held  in  great  reverence. 
One  night  the  chapel  took  fire,  and  there  was  nothing  left  of  the 
statue  but  a  charred  and  formless  trunk.  The  alms  of  the  faithful 
had  soon  repaired  the  poor  little  sanctuary;  on  the  altar  a  new 
statue  replaced  the  old  one,  which,  not  to  destroy  it,  they  relegated 
to  an  out  of  the  way  corner;  whereupon  the  simple  faith  of  the 
peasants  in  that  neighborhood  was  greatly  troubled.  The  new 
Virgin,  in  spite  of  her  costly  veil  and  brilliant  apparel,  could  not 
command  any  prayers;  they  all  took  their  vows  to  the  charred 
fragment  which  had  been  deprived  of  its  honors.  This  old,  muti- 
lated statue  had  formerly  heard  their  prayers,  and  received  the 
confidences  of  their  troubles;  to  have  gone  to  another  Virgin,  be- 
cause she  was  new  and  more  beautifully  attired,  would  in  their 
eyes  have  been  an  act  of  disloyalty. 

Accordingly,  the  first  duty  of  criticism,  in  order  to  comprehend 
the  beliefs  of  the  past,  is  to  place  itself  in  the  position  of  the  past. 
Physical  science,  on  the  one  hand,  by  excluding  from  nature  every- 
thing that  resembles  free  agency,  and  monotheism,  on  the  other,  by 
making  us  conceive  of  the  world  as  a  sort  of  machine  without  other 
form  of  life  than  that  conferred  upon  it  by  the  Supreme  Artificer, 
have  made  it  very  difficult  for  us  to  understand  a  religion  whose 
point  of  departure  was  nature  conceived  as  animate.  But  how 
many  other  manifestations  have  there  been  in  the  history  of  reli- 
gion, the  causes  of  which  elude  ordinary  good  sense,  which  never- 
theless have  beguiled  whole  sections  of  humanity !  When  people 
who  have  but  a  slight  acquaintance  with  matters  outside  of  Europe 
are  told  that  Buddhism  is  a  religion  devoid  of  God,  or  at  least  one 
in  which  the  gods  (devas)  are  beings  of  so  little  consequence  that, 
in  order  to  attain  to  the  ultimate  perfection,  they  are  obliged  to 
become  men,  and  to  owe  their  salvation  to  a  man,  the  thing  seems 
inconceivable;  nevertheless  the  statement  is  true  to  the  letter,  and 
the  religion  in  question  is  the  one  which  at  the  present  time  num- 
bers the  largest  following  in  the  world.  In  general,  we  do  not  form 
broad  enough  notions  of  the  diversity  of  the  products  of  the  human 
spirit.  It  is  only  the  comparative  study  of  languages,  literatures, 
and  religions,  which,  by  enlarging  the  circle  of  accepted  ideas, 
makes  one  realize  under  how  many  different  aspects  the  world  has 
been  and  can  be  considered. 

One  thing  is  certain.  To  our  way  of  judging,  antiquity,  apart 
from  the  schools  of  philosophy,  lacked  one  of  the  elements  which 


PAGANISM  267 

we  regard  as  essential  to  sound  thinking;  I  mean,  a  clear  concep- 
tion of  nature  and  its  inexorable  laws.  During  brilliant  epochs,  nOt 
disadvantage  arose  from  that.  On  the  contrary,  the  scientific  spiritJ 
which  it  is  the  eternal  glory  of  Greece  to  have  introduced  into  the 
world,  in  a  sense  owes  its  origin  to  polytheism.  It  is  quite  remark- 
able, indeed,  that  the  nomad  Semitic  peoples,  who  from  the  begin- 
ning seem  more  or  less  to  have  tended  toward  monotheism,  never 
had  an  indigenous  science  or  philosophy.  Islam,  which  is  the  purest 
product  of  the  Semitic  genius,  and  may  be  regarded  as  the  ideal 
form  of  monotheism,  has  stifled  all  curiosity,  all  investigation  into 
causes,  among  the  peoples  who  are  under  its  sway.  '  God  is  great !  7 
'God  knows !l — such  is  the  response  of  the  Arab  to  the  narratives 
best  calculated  to  astonish  him.  The  Jews,  so  superior  in  point  of 
religion  to  all  the  other  peoples  of  antiquity,  do  not  present  one 
single  trace  of  a  scientific  movement  before  their  contact  with  the 
Greeks.  'From  the  earliest  times,'  as  M.  Ravaisson  well  says,  'the 
Hebrew  religion,  in  order  to  account  for  man  and  nature,  had 
invoked  the  holy  and  omnipotent  God,  the  Eternal  One,  anterior 
and  superior  to  the  world,  sole  author  of  all  things,  and  supreme 
legislator  over  all!  On  the  contrary,  the  innumerable  divinities  of 
other  religions,  and  notably  of  the  Hellenic,  were  only  particular 
powers,  mutually  limited,  comparable  to  natural  objects,  and  sub- 
ject in  much  the  same  way  to  imperfection  and  change.  As  a  re- 
sult, seeing  in  the  universe — in  its  successive  phenomena  and  in  its 
different  parts — a  unity,  an  order,  a  harmony,  which  neither  the 
discordant  wills  of  the  gods  nor  their  chance  adventures  in  any 
way  served  to  explain,  the  need  was  very  early  felt  of  trying  to  dis- 
cover, by  means  of  the  reason,  that  universal  reason  in  things,  con- 
cerning which  mythology  was  silent.  Such  was,  it  would  seem, 
the  origin  of  philosophy  amongst  the  Greeks.'3 

Accordingly,  the  absence  of  a  rule  of  religion  proved  only  an 
advantage  so  long  as  the  Greek  spirit  preserved  its  vigor  and 
originality.  But  when  intellectual  culture  lost  ground,  supersti- 
tion, to  which  polytheism  offered  too  little  obstruction,  spread  over 
the  world,  and  damaged  even  the  best  minds.  I  know  of  nothing 
sadder  in  this  regard  than  the  spectacle  presented  by  philosophy 
from  the  third  century  of  our  era  on.  What  men  they  were — Ammo- 
nius,  Plotinus,  Proclus,  Isidore !  What  nobility  of  mind  and  heart ! 
Where  is  the  martyr  to  compare  for  her  austere  beauty  with 
Hypatia?    More  than  all,  what  a  man  was  Porphyry,  perhaps  the 

» Ravaisson,  M Smoires  de  I  'AcadSmie  des  Inscriptions  et  Belles-Lettres 
21. 1. 1  ff. 


268  ERNEST  RENAN 

only  scholar  in  antiquity  (as  Niebuhr  and  M.  Letronne  have  well 
shown)  who  was  critical  and  exact !  And  yet  what  an  indelible  blot 
appeared  in  the  life  of  these  great  persons!  What  aberrations  in 
all  matters  concerning  demons,  familiar  spirits,  and  white  magic ! 
Porphyry,  an  excellent  critic  in  all  other  respects,  in  the  field  of 
metempsychosis  and  apparitions  accepts  things  that  are  hardly  less 
extravagant  than  table-turning  and  spirit-rapping.  Some  time  ago 
I  set  about  reading  the  lives  of  these  great  men,  in  so  many  ways 
admirable,  with  a  view  to  presenting  them  as  the  saints  of  phi- 
losophy; and  assuredly  for  their  beauty  of  character,  their  moral 
grandeur,  their  elevation  of  spirit,  and  often,  too,  for  the  legends 
attaching  to  their  names,  they  are  worthy  to  be  set  side  by  side  with 
the  most  revered  Christian  ascetics.  But  their  credulity  on  the 
head  of  spirits  grieved  me,  and  prevented  my  taking  any  pleasure 
in  the  beautiful  aspects  of  their  lives.  There,  too,  is  the  poison 
which  taints  the  otherwise  highly  attractive  character  of  Julian.  If 
the  restoration  of  paganism  was  to  serve  no  other  purpose  than  to 
revive  the  crude  superstitions  with  which  one  sees  that  emperor 
so  constantly  occupied,  it  is  hard  to  understand  that  a  man  of  so 
much  intelligence  should  have  acquired  the  evil  name  of  'apostate' 
for  the  sake  of  such  trivial  nonsense. 


XX 

PAGANISM  AND  ME.  LOWES  DICKINSON 1 
By  Gilbert  K.  Chesterton 

Of  the  New  Paganism  (or  neo-Paganism),  as  it  was  preached 
flamboyantly  by  Mr.  Swinburne  or  delicately  by  Walter  Pater, 
there  is  no  necessity  to  take  any  very  grave  account,  except  as  a 
thing  which  left  behind  it  incomparable  exercises  in  the  English 
language.  The  New  Paganism  is  no  longer  new,  and  it  never  at 
any  time  bore  the  smallest  resemblance  to  Paganism.  The  ideas 
about  the  ancient  civilization  which  it  has  left  loose  in  the  public 
mind  are  certainly  extraordinary  enough.  The  term  'pagan'  is 
continually  used  in  fiction  and  light  literature  as  meaning  a  man 
without  any  religion,  whereas  a  pagan  was  generally  a  man  with 
about  half  a  dozen.  The  pagans,  according  to  this  notion,  were 
continually  crowning  themselves  with  flowers  and  dancing  about  in 
an  irresponsible  state,  whereas,  if  there  were  two  things  that  the 
best  pagan  civilization  did  honestly  believe  in,  they  were  a  rather 
too  rigid  dignity  and  a  much  too  rigid  responsibility.  Pagans  are 
depicted  as  above  all  things  inebriate  and  lawless,  whereas  they 
were  above  all  things  reasonable  and  respectable.  They  are  praised 
as  disobedient  when  they  had  only  one  great  virtue — civic  obedience. 
They  are  envied  and  admired  as  shamelessly  happy  when  they  had 
only  one  great  sin — despair. 

Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson,  the  most  pregnant  and  provocative  of 
recent  writers  on  this  and  similar  subjects,  is  far  too  solid  a  man  to 
have  fallen  into  this  old  error  of  the  mere  anarchy  of  Paganism. 
In  order  to  make  hay  of  that  Hellenic  enthusiasm  which  has  as  its 
ideal  mere  appetite  and  egotism,  it  is  not  necessary  to  know  much 
philosophy,  but  merely  to  know  a  little  Greek.  Mr.  Lowes  Dickin- 
son knows  a  great  deal  of  philosophy,  and  also  a  great  deal  of 
Greek,  and  his  error,  if  error  he  has,  is  not  that  of  the  crude 

[i  Paganism  and  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson,  No.  XII  in  Mr.  Chesterton 's  Here- 
tics (pp.  153-170),  is  here  reprinted  through  the  courtesy  of  the  publishers, 
John  Lane  Company. — Editor.] 


270  GILBERT  K.  CHESTERTON 

hedonist.  But  the  contrast  which  he  offers  between  Christianity 
and  Paganism  in  the  matter  of  moral  ideals — a  contrast  which  he 
states  very  ably  in  a  paper  called  How  long  halt  ye  ?  which  appeared 
in  the  Independent  Review — does,  I  think,  contain  an  error  of  a 
deeper  kind.  According  to  him,  the  ideal  of  Paganism  was  not, 
indeed,  a  mere  frenzy  of  lust  and  liberty  and  caprice,  but  was  an 
ideal  of  full  and  satisfied  humanity.  According  to  him,  the  ideal 
of  Christianity  was  the  ideal  of  asceticism.  When  I  say  that  I 
think  this  idea  wholly  wrong  as  a  matter  of  philosophy  and  his- 
tory, I  am  not  talking  for  the  moment  about  any  ideal  Christianity 
of  my  own,  or  even  of  any  primitive  Christianity  undefiled  by  after 
events.  I  am  not,  like  so  many  modern  Christian  idealists,  basing 
my  case  upon  certain  things  which  Christ  said.  Neither  am  I,  like 
so  many  other  Christian  idealists,  basing  my  case  upon  certain 
things  that  Christ  forgot  to  say.  I  take  historic  Christianity  with 
all  its  sins  upon  its  head ;  I  take  it,  as  I  would  take  Jacobinism,  or 
Mormonism,  or  any  other  mixed  or  unpleasing  human  product, 
and  I  say  that  the  meaning  of  its  action  was  not  to  be  found  in 
asceticism.  I  say  that  its  point  of  departure  from  Paganism  was 
not  asceticism.  I  say  that  its  point  of  difference  with  the  modern 
world  was  not  asceticism.  I  say  that  St.  Simeon  Stylites  had  not 
his  main  inspiration  in  asceticism.  I  say  that  the  main  Christian 
impulse  cannot  be  described  as  asceticism,  even  in  the  ascetics. 

Let  me  set  about  making  the  matter  clear.  There  is  one  broad 
fact  about  the  relations  of  Christianity  and  Paganism  which  is  so 
simple  that  many  will  smile  at  it,  but  which  is  so  important  that  all 
moderns  forget  it.  The  primary  fact  about  Christianity  and  Pagan- 
ism is  that  one  came  after  the  other.  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson  speaks 
of  them  as  if  they  were  parallel  ideals — even  speaks  as  if  Paganism 
were  the  newer  of  the  two,  and  the  more  fitted  for  a  new  age.  He 
suggests  that  the  pagan  ideal  will  be  the  ultimate  good  of  man ;  but 
if  that  is  so,  we  must  at  least  ask  with  more  curiosity  than  he 
allows  for,  why  it  was  that  man  actually  found  his  ultimate  good 
on  earth  under  the  stars,  and  threw  it  away  again.  It  is  this 
extraordinary  enigma  to  which  I  propose  to  attempt  an  answer. 

There  is  only  one  thing  in  the  modern  world  that  has  been  face  to 
face  with  Paganism;  there  is  only  one  thing  in  the  modern  world 
which  in  that  sense  knows  anything  about  Paganism;  and  that  is 
Christianity.  That  fact  is  really  the  weak  point  in  the  whole  of 
that  hedonistic  neo-Paganism  of  which  I  have  spoken.  All  that 
genuinely  remains  of  the  ancient  hymns  or  the  ancient  dances  of 
Europe,  all  that  has  honestly  come  to  us  from  the  festivals  of 


PAGANISM  AND  MR.  LOWES  DICKINSON  271 

Phoebus  or  Pan,  is  to  be  found  in  the  festivals  of  the  Christian 
Church.  If  any  one  wants  to  hold  the  end  of  a  chain  which  really 
goes  back  to  the  heathen  mysteries,  he  had  better  take  hold  of  a 
festoon  of  flowers  at  Easter  or  a  string  of  sausages  at  Christmas. 
Everything  else  in  the  modern  world  is  of  Christian  origin,  even 
everything  that  seems  most  anti-Christian.  The  French  Revolu- 
tion is  of  Christian  origin.  The  newspaper  is  of  Christian  origin. 
The  anarchists  are  of  Christian  origin.  Physical  science  is  of  Chris- 
tian origin.  The  attack  on  Christianity  is  of  Christian  origin. 
There  is  one  thing,  and  one  thing  only,  in  existence  at  the  present 
day,  which  can  in  any  sense  accurately  be  said  to  be  of  pagan  origin, 
and  that  is  Christianity. 

The  real  difference  between  Paganism  and  Christianity  is  per- 
fectly summed  up  in  the  difference  between  the  pagan,  or  natural, 
virtues,  and  those  three  virtues  of  Christianity  which  the  Church 
of  Rome  calls  virtues  of  grace.  The  pagan,  or  rational,  virtues 
are  such  things  as  justice  and  temperance,  and  Christianity  has 
adopted  them.  The  three  mystical  virtues  which  Christianity  has 
not  adopted,  but  invented,  are  faith,  hope,  and  charity.  Now  much 
easy  and  foolish  Christian  rhetoric  could  easily  be  poured  out  upon 
those  three  words,  but  I  desire  to  confine  myself  to  the  two  facts 
which  are  evident  about  them.  The  first  evident  fact  (in  marked 
contrast  to  the  delusion  of  the  dancing  pagan) — the  first  evident 
fact,  I  say,  is  that  the  pagan  virtues,  such  as  justice  and  temper- 
ance, are  the  sad  virtues,  and  that  the  mystical  virtues  of  faith, 
hope,  and  charity  are  the  gay  and  exuberant  virtues.  And  the  sec- 
ond evident  fact,  which  is  even  more  evident,  is  the  fact  that  the 
pagan  virtues  are  the  reasonable  virtues,  and  that  the  Christian 
virtues  of  faith,  hope,  and  charity  are  in  their  essence  as  unreason- 
able as  they  can  be. 

As  the  word  'unreasonable'  is  open  to  misunderstanding,  the 
matter  may  be  more  accurately  put  by  saying  that  each  one  of 
these  Christian  or  mystical  virtues  involves  a  paradox  in  its  own 
nature,  and  that  this  is  not  true  of  any  of  the  typically  pagan  or 
rationalist  virtues.  Justice  consists  in  finding  out  a  certain  thing 
due  to  a  certain  man  and  giving  it  to  him.  Temperance  consists 
in  finding  out  the  proper  limit  of  a  particular  indulgence  and 
adhering  to  that.  But  charity  means  pardoning  what  is  unpar- 
donable, or  it  is  no  virtue  at  all.  Hope  means  hoping  when  things 
are  hopeless,  or  it  is  no  virtue  at  all.  And  faith  means  believing  the 
incredible,  or  it  is  no  virtue  at  all. 

It  is  somewhat  amusing,  indeed,  to  notice  the  difference  between 


272  GILBERT  K.  CHESTERTON 

the  fate  of  these  three  paradoxes  in  the  fashion  of  the  modern  mind. 
Charity  is  a  fashionable  virtue  in  our  time;  it  is  lit  up  by  the 
gigantic  firelight  of  Dickens.  Hope  is  a  fashionable  virtue  to-day ; 
our  attention  has  been  arrested  for  it  by  the  sudden  and  silver 
trumpet  of  Stevenson.  But  faith  is  unfashionable,  and  it  is  cus- 
tomary on  every  side  to  cast  against  it  the  fact  that  it  is  a  paradox. 
Everybody  mockingly  repeats  the  famous  childish  definition  that 
faith  is  'the  power  of  believing  that  which  we  know  to  be  untrue.' 
Yet  it  is  not  one  atom  more  paradoxical  than  hope  or  charity. 
Charity  is  the  power  of  defending  that  which  we  know  to  be  inde- 
fensible. Hope  is  the  power  of  being  cheerful  in  circumstances 
which  we  know  to  be  desperate.  It  is  true  that  there  is  a  state  of 
hope  which  belongs  to  bright  prospects  and  the  morning ;  but  that 
is  not  the  virtue  of  hope.  The  virtue  of  hope  exists  only  in  earth- 
quake and  eclipse.  It  is  true  that  there  is  a  thing  crudely  called 
charity,  which  means  charity  to  the  deserving  poor;  but  charity  to 
the  deserving  is  not  charity  at  all,  but  justice.  It  is  the  undeserving 
who  require  it,  and  the  ideal  either  does  not  exist  at  all,  or  exists 
wholly  for  them.  For  practical  purposes  it  is  at  the  hopeless 
moment  that  we  require  the  hopeful  man,  and  the  virtue  either 
does  not  exist  at  all,  or  begins  to  exist  at  that  moment.  Exactly 
at  the  instant  when  hope  ceases  to  be  reasonable  it  begins  to  be 
useful. 

Now  the  old  pagan  world  went  perfectly  straightforward  until 
it  discovered  that  going  straightforward  is  an  enormous  mistake. 
It  was  nobly  and  beautifully  reasonable,  and  discovered  in  its  death- 
pang  this  lasting  and  valuable  truth,  a  heritage  for  the  ages,  that 
reasonableness  will  not  do.  The  pagan  age  was  truly  an  Eden  or 
golden  age,  in  this  essential  sense,  that  it  is  not  to  be  recovered. 
And  it  is  not  to  be  recovered  in  this  sense  again  that,  while  we  are 
certainly  jollier  than  the  pagans,  and  much  more  right  than  the 
pagans,  there  is  not  one  of  us  who  can,  by  the  utmost  stretch  of 
energy,  be  so  sensible  as  the  pagans.  That  naked  innocence  of  the 
intellect  cannot  be  recovered  by  any  man  after  Christianity;  and 
for  this  excellent  reason,  that  every  man  after  Christianity  knows 
it  to  be  misleading.  Let  me  take  an  example,  the  first  that  oceurs 
to  the  mind,  of  this  impossible  plainness  in  the  pagan  point  of 
view.  The  greatest  tribute  to  Christianity  in  the  modern  world 
is  Tennyson's  Ulysses.  The  poet  reads  into  the  story  of  Ulysses 
the  conception  of  an  incurable  desire  to  wander.  But  the  real 
Ulysses  does  not  desire  to  wander  at  all.  He  desires  to  get  home. 
He  displays  his  heroic  and  unconquerable  qualities  in  resisting  the 


PAGANISM  AND  MR.  LOWES  DICKINSON  273 

misfortunes  which  balk  him;  but  that  is  all.  There  is  no  love  of 
adventure  for  its  own  sake;  that  is  a  Christian  product.  There  is 
no  love  of  Penelope  for  her  own  sake;  that  is  a  Christian  product. 
Everything  in  that  old  world  would  appear  to  have  been  clean  and 
obvious.  A  good  man  was  a  good  man ;  a  bad  man  was  a  bad  man. 
For  this  reason  they  had  no  charity;  for  charity  is  a  reverent 
agnosticism  towards  the  complexity  of  the  soul.  For  this  reason 
they  had  no  such  thing  as  the  art  of  fiction,  the  novel ;  for  the  novel 
is  a  creation  of  the  mystical  idea  of  charity.  For  them  a  pleasant 
landscape  was  pleasant,  and  an  unpleasant  landscape  unpleasant. 
Hence  they  had  no  idea  of  romance ;  for  romance  consists  in  think- 
ing a  thing  more  delightful  because  it  is  dangerous;  it  is  a  Chris- 
tian idea.  In  a  word,  we  cannot  reconstruct  or  even  imagine  the 
beautiful  and  astonishing  pagan  world.  It  was  a  world  in  which 
common  sense  was  really  common. 

My  general  meaning  touching  the  three  virtues  of  which  I  have 
spoken  will  now,  I  hope,  be  sufficiently  clear.  They  are  all  three 
paradoxical,  they  are  all  three  practical,  and  they  are  all  three  para- 
doxical because  they  are  practical.  It  is  the  stress  of  ultimate  need, 
and  a  terrible  knowledge  of  things  as  they  are,  which  led  men  to  set 
up  these  riddles,  and  to  die  for  them.  "Whatever  may  be  the  mean- 
ing of  the  contradiction,  it  is  the  fact  that  the  only  kind  of  hope 
that  is  of  any  use  in  a  battle  is  a  hope  that  denies  arithmetic. 
Whatever  may  be  the  meaning  of  the  contradiction,  it  is  the  fact 
that  the  only  kind  of  charity  which  any  weak  spirit  wants,  or  which 
any  generous  spirit  feels,  is  the  charity  which  forgives  the  sins 
that  are  like  scarlet.  Whatever  may  be  the  meaning  of  faith,  it 
must  always  mean  a  certainty  about  something  we  cannot  prove. 
Thus,  for  instance,  we  believe  by  faith  in  the  existence  of  other 
people. 

But  there  is  another  Christian  virtue,  a  virtue  far  more  obviously 
and  historically  connected  with  Christianity,  which  will  illustrate 
even  better  the  connection  between  paradox  and  practical  neces- 
sity. This  virtue  cannot  be  questioned  in  its  capacity  as  a  historical 
symbol ;  certainly  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson  will  not  question  it.  It  has 
been  the  boast  of  hundreds  of  the  champions  of  Christianity.  It  has 
been  the  taunt  of  hundreds  of  the  opponents  of  Christianity.  It  is, 
in  essence,  the  basis  of  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson's  whole  distinction 
between  Christianity  and  Paganism.  I  mean,  of  course,  the  virtue 
of  humility.  I  admit,  of  course,  most  readily,  that  a  great  deal  of 
false  Eastern  humility  (that  is,  of  strictly  ascetic  humility)  mixed 
itself  with  the  main  stream  of  European  Christianity.    We  must 


274  GILBERT  K.  CHESTERTON 

not  forget  that  when  we  speak  of  Christianity  we  are  speaking  of 
a  whole  continent  for  about  a  thousand  years.  But  of  this  virtue 
even  more  than  of  the  other  three,  I  would  maintain  the  general 
proposition  adopted  above.  Civilization  discovered  Christian  humil- 
ity for  the  same  urgent  reason  that  it  discovered  faith  and  charity — 
that  is,  because  Christian  civilization  had  to  discover  it  or  die. 

The  great  psychological  discovery  of  Paganism,  which  turned  it 
into  Christianity,  can  be  expressed  with  some  accuracy  in  one 
phrase.  The  pagan  set  out,  with  admirable  sense,  to  enjoy  him- 
self. By  the  end  of  his  civilization  he  had  discovered  that  a  man 
cannot  enjoy  himself  and  continue  to  enjoy  anything  else.  Mr. 
Lowes  Dickinson  has  pointed  out,  in  words  too  excellent  to  need  any 
further  elucidation,  the  absurd  shallowness  of  those  who  imagine 
that  the  pagan  enjoyed  himself  only  in  a  materialistic  sense.  Of 
course,  he  enjoyed  himself,  not  only  intellectually  even,  he  enjoyed 
himself  morally,  he  enjoyed  himself  spiritually.  But  it  was  him- 
self that  he  was  enjoying ;  on  the  face  of  it,  a  very  natural  thing  to 
do.  Now,  the  psychological  discovery  is  merely  this,  that  whereas 
it  had  been  supposed  that  the  fullest  possible  enjoyment  is  to  be 
found  by  extending  our  ego  to  infinity,  the  truth  is  that  the  fullest 
possible  enjoyment  is  to  be  found  by  reducing  our  ego  to  zero. 

Humility  is  the  thing  which  is  for  ever  renewing  the  earth  and 
the  stars.  It  is  humility,  and  not  duty,  which  preserves  the  stars 
from  wrong,  from  the  unpardonable  wrong  of  casual  resignation ;  it 
is  through  humility  that  the  most  ancient  heavens  for  us  are  fresh 
and  strong.  The  curse  that  came  before  history  has  laid  on  us  all  a 
tendency  to  be  weary  of  wonders.  If  we  saw  the  sun  for  the  first 
time  it  would  be  the  most  fearful  and  beautiful  of  meteors.  Now 
that  we  see  it  for  the  hundredth  time  we  call  it,  in  the  hideous  and 
blasphemous  phrase  of  Wordsworth,  'the  light  of  common  day.' 
We  are  inclined  to  increase  our  claims.  We  are  inclined  to  demand 
six  suns,  to  demand  a  blue  sun,  to  demand  a  green  sun.  Humility 
is  perpetually  putting  us  back  in  the  primal  darkness.  There  all 
light  is  lightning,  startling  and  instantaneous.  Until  we  under- 
stand that  original  dark,  in  which  we  have  neither  sight  nor  expec- 
tation, we  can  give  no  hearty  and  childlike  praise  to  the  splendid 
sensationalism  of  things.  The  terms  'pessimism'  and  'optimism/ 
like  most  modern  terms,  are  unmeaning.  But  if  they  can  be  used 
in  any  vague  sense  as  meaning  something,  we  may  say  that  in  this 
great  fact  pessimism  is  the  very  basis  of  optimism.  The  man  who 
destroys  himself  creates  the  universe.  To  the  humble  man,  and  to 
the  humble  man  alone,  the  sun  is  really  a  sun ;  to  the  humble  man, 


PAGANISM  AND  ME.  LOWES  DICKINSON  275 

and  to  the  humble  man  alone,  the  sea  is  really  a  sea.  When  he 
looks  at  all  the  faces  in  the  street,  he  does  not  only  realize  that  men 
are  alive,  he  realizes  with  a  dramatic  pleasure  that  they  are  not 
dead. 

I  have  not  spoken  of  another  aspect  of  the  discovery  of  humility 
as  a  psychological  necessity,  because  it  is  more  commonly  insisted 
on,  and  is  in  itself  more  obvious.  But  it  is  equally  clear  that  humil- 
ity is  a  permanent  necessity  as  a  condition  of  effort  and  self-exam- 
ination. It  is  one  of  the  deadly  fallacies  of  Jingo  politics  that  a 
nation  is  stronger  for  despising  other  nations.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  strongest  nations  are  those,  like  Prussia  or  Japan,  which  began 
from  very  mean  beginnings,  but  have  not  been  too  proud  to  sit 
at  the  feet  of  the  foreigner  and  learn  everything  from  him.  Almost 
every  obvious  and  direct  victory  has  been  the  victory  of  the  plagia- 
rist. This  is,  indeed,  only  a  very  paltry  by-product  of  humility,  but 
it  is  a  product  of  humility,  and,  therefore,  it  is  successful.  Prussia 
had  no  Christian  humility  in  its  internal  arrangements;  hence  its 
internal  arrangements  were  miserable.  But  it  had  enough  Chris- 
tian humility  slavishly  to  copy  France  (even  down  to  Frederick  the 
Great's  poetry),  and  that  which  it  had  the  humility  to  copy  it  had 
ultimately  the  honor  to  conquer.  The  case  of  the  Japanese  is  even 
more  obvious ;  their  only  Christian  and  their  only  beautiful  quality 
is  that  they  have  humbled  themselves  to  be  exalted.  All  this  aspect 
of  humility,  however,  as  connected  with  the  matter  of  effort  and 
striving  for  a  standard  set  above  us,  I  dismiss  as  having  been  suffi- 
ciently pointed  out  by  almost  all  idealistic  writers. 

It  may  be  worth  while,  however,  to  point  out  the  interesting  dis- 
parity in  the  matter  of  humility  between  the  modern  notion  of  the 
strong  man  and  the  actual  records  of  strong  men.  Carlyle  objected 
to  the  statement  that  no  man  could  be  a  hero  to  his  valet.  Every 
sympathy  can  be  extended  towards  him  in  the  matter  if  he  merely 
or  mainly  meant  that  the  phrase  was  a  disparagement  of  hero- 
worship.  Hero-worship  is  certainly  a  generous  and  human  impulse ; 
the  hero  may  be  faulty,  but  the  worship  can  hardly  be.  It  may  be 
that  no  man  would  be  a  hero  to  his  valet.  But  any  man  would  be 
a  valet  to  his  hero.  But  in  truth  both  the  proverb  itself  and  Car- 
lyle's  stricture  upon  it  ignore  the  most  essential  matter  at  issue. 
The  ultimate  psychological  truth  is  not  that  no  man  is  a  hero  to 
his  valet.  The  ultimate  psychological  truth,  the  foundation  of 
Christianity,  is  that  no  man  is  a  hero  to  himself.  Cromwell,  accord- 
ing to  Carlyle,  was  a  strong  man.  According  to  Cromwell,  he  was 
a  weak  one. 


276  GILBERT  K.  CHESTERTON 

The  weak  point  in  the  whole  of  Carlyle's  case  for  aristocracy 
lies,  indeed,  in  his  most  celebrated  phrase.  Carlyle  said  that  men 
were  mostly  fools.  Christianity,  with  a  surer  and  more  reverent 
realism,  says  that  they  are  all  fools.  This  doctrine  is  sometimes 
called  the  doctrine  of  original  sin.  It  may  also  be  described  as  the 
doctrine  of  the  equality  of  men.  But  the  essential  point  of  it  is 
merely  this,  that  whatever  primary  and  far-reaching  moral  dangers 
affect  any  man,  affect  all  men.  All  men  can  be  criminals,  if  tempted ; 
all  men  can  be  heroes,  if  inspired.  And  this  doctrine  does  away 
altogether  with  Carlyle's  pathetic  belief  (or  any  one  else's  pathetic 
belief)  in  'the  wise  few.'  There  are  no  wise  few.  Every  aristocracy 
that  has  ever  existed  has  behaved,  in  all  essential  points,  exactly 
like  a  small  mob.  Every  oligarchy  is  merely  a  knot  of  men  in  the 
street — that  is  to  say,  it  is  very  jolly,  but  not  infallible.  And  no 
oligarchies  in  the  world's  history  have  ever  come  off  so  badly  in 
practical  affairs  as  the  very  proud  oligarchies — the  oligarchy  of 
Poland,  the  oligarchy  of  Venice.  And  the  armies  that  have  most 
swiftly  and  suddenly  broken  their  enemies  in  pieces  have  been  the 
religious  armies — the  Moslem  armies,  for  instance,  or  the  Puritan 
armies.  And  a  religious  army  may,  by  its  nature,  be  defined  as  an 
army  in  which  every  man  is  taught,  not  to  exalt,  but  to  abase  himself. 
Many  modern  Englishmen  talk  of  themselves  as  the  sturdy  descend- 
ants of  their  sturdy  Puritan  fathers.  As  a  fact,  they  would  run 
away  from  a  cow.  If  you  asked  one  of  their  Puritan  fathers,  if 
you  asked  Bunyan,  for  instance,  whether  he  was  sturdy,  he  would 
have  answered,  with  tears,  that  he  was  as  weak  as  water.  And 
because  of  this  he  would  have  borne  tortures.  And  this  virtue  of 
humility,  while  being  practical  enough  to  win  battles,  will  always 
be  paradoxical  enough  to  puzzle  pedants.  It  is  at  one  with  the 
virtue  of  charity  in  this  respect.  Every  generous  person  will  admit 
that  the  one  kind  of  sin  which  charity  should  cover  is  the  sin  which 
is  inexcusable.  And  every  generous  person  will  equally  agree  that 
the  one  kind  of  pride  which  is  wholly  damnable  is  the  pride  of  the 
man  who  has  something  to  be  proud  of.  The  pride  which,  propor- 
tionally speaking,  does  not  hurt  the  character,  is  the  pride  in 
things  which  reflect  no  credit  on  the  person  at  all.  Thus  it  does  a 
man  no  harm  to  be  proud  of  his  country,  and  comparatively  little 
harm  to  be  proud  of  his  remote  ancestors.  It  does  him  more  harm 
to  be  proud  of  having  made  money,  because  in  that  he  has  a  little 
more  reason  for  pride.  It  does  him  more  harm  still  to  be  proud  of 
what  is  nobler  than  money — intellect.  And  it  does  him  most  harm 
of  all  to  value  himself  for  the  most  valuable  thing  on  earth — good- 


PAGANISM  AND  MR.  LOWES  DICKINSON  277 

ness.  The  man  who  is  proud  of  what  is  really  creditable  to  him 
is  the  Pharisee,  the  man  whom  Christ  himself  could  not  forbear 
to  strike. 

My  objection  to  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson  and  the  reassertors  of  the 
pagan  ideal  is,  then,  this.  I  accuse  them  of  ignoring  definite  human 
discoveries  in  the  moral  world,  discoveries  as  definite,  though  not 
as  material,  as  the  discovery  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood.  We 
cannot  go  back  to  an  ideal  of  reason  and  sanity;  for  mankind  has 
discovered  that  reason  does  not  lead  to  sanity.  We  cannot  go 
back  to  an  ideal  of  pride  and  enjoyment;  for  mankind  has  dis- 
covered that  pride  does  not  lead  to  enjoyment.  I  do  not  know  by 
what  extraordinary  mental  accident  modern  writers  so  constantly 
connect  the  idea  of  progress  with  the  idea  of  independent  thinking. 
Progress  is  obviously  the  antithesis  of  independent  thinking;  for 
under  independent  or  individualistic  thinking,  every  man  starts  at 
the  beginning,  and  goes,  in  all  probability,  just  as  far  as  his  father 
before  him.  But  if  there  really  be  anything  of  the  nature  of 
progress,  it  must  mean,  above  all  things,  the  careful  study  and 
assumption  of  the  whole  of  the  past.  I  accuse  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson 
and  his  school  of  reaction  in  the  only  real  sense.  If  he  likes,  let 
him  ignore  these  great  historic  mysteries — the  mystery  of  charity, 
the  mystery  of  chivalry,  the  mystery  of  faith.  If  he  likes,  let  him 
ignore  the  plough  or  the  printing-press.  But  if  we  do  revive  and 
pursue  the  pagan  ideal  of  a  simple  and  rational  self-eompletion 
we  shall  end — where  Paganism  ended.  I  do  not  mean  that  we  shall 
end  in  destruction.    I  mean  that  we  shall  end  in  Christianity. 


XXI 

FROM  OLD  PICTURES  IN  FLORENCE  1 

By  Robert  Browning 

1  If  you  knew  their  work,  you  would  deal  your  dole. ' 

May  I  take  upon  me  to  instruct  you  ? 
When  Greek  art  ran,  and  reached  the  goal, 

Thus  much  had  the  world  to  boast  in  fructu: 
The  truth  of  man,  as  by  God  first  spoken, 

Which  the  actual  generations  garble, 
Was  re-uttered,  and  soul  (which  limbs  betoken) 

And  limbs  (soul  informs)  made  new  in  marble. 

So,  you  saw  yourself  as  you  wished  you  were, 

As  you  might  have  been,  as  you  cannot  be — 
Earth  here,  rebuked  by  Olympus  there ; 

And  grew  content  in  your  poor  degree 
With  your  little  power,  by  those  statues '  godhead, 

And  your  little  scope,  by  their  eyes'  full  sway, 
And  your  little  grace,  by  their  grace  embodied, 

And  your  little  date,  by  their  forms  that  stay. 

You  would  fain  be  kinglier,  say,  than  I  am? 

Even  so,  you  will  not  sit  like  Theseus. 
You  would  prove  a  model  ?    The  son  of  Priam 

Has  yet  the  advantage  in  arms'  and  knees'  use. 
You're  wroth — can  you  slay  your  snake  like  Apollo? 

You  're  grieved — still  Niobe  's  the  grander ! 
You  live — there's  the  Racers'  frieze  to  follow. 

You  die — there's  the  dying  Alexander. 


i  Stanzas  11-20. 


FROM  OLD  PICTURES  IN  FLORENCE  279 

So,  testing  your  weakness  by  their  strength, 

Your  meagre  charms  by  their  rounded  beauty, 
Measured  by  art  in  your  breadth  and  length, 

You  learned — to  submit  is  a  mortal's  duty. 
When  I  say  'you,'  'tis  the  common  soul, 

The  collective,  I  mean :  the  race  of  man 
That  receives  life  in  parts  to  live  in  a  whole, 

And  grow  here  according  to  God's  clear  plan. 

Growth  came  when,  looking  your  last  on  them  all, 

You  turned  your  eyes  inwardly  one  fine  day, 
And  cried  with  a  start :  What  if  we  so  small 

Be  greater  and  grander  the  while  than  they  ? 
Are  they  perfect  of  lineament,  perfect  of  stature  ? 

In  both,  of  such  lower  types  are  we 
Precisely  because  of  our  wider  nature ; 

For  time,  theirs — ours,  for  eternity. 

To-day's  brief  passion  limits  their  range; 

It  seethes  with  the  morrow  for  us,  and  more. 
They  are  perfect — how  else  ?  they  shall  never  change. 

We  are  faulty — why  not?  we  have  time  in  store. 
The  Artificer's  hand  is  not  arrested 

With  us ;  we  are  rough-hewn,  nowise  polished. 
They  stand  for  our  copy,  and,  once  invested 

With  all  they  can  teach,  we  shall  see  them  abolished. 

'Tis  a  lifelong  toil  till  our  lump  be  leaven — 

The  better !    What 's  come  to  perfection  perishes. 
Things  learned  on  earth  we  shall  practise  in  heaven. 

Works  done  least  rapidly  art  most  cherishes. 
Thyself  shalt  afford  the  example,  Giotto ! 

Thy  one  work,  not  to  decrease  or  diminish, 
Done  at  a  stroke,  was  just  (was  it  not?)  '0'! 

Thy  great  Campanile  is  still  to  finish. 

Is  it  true  that  we  are  now,  and  shall  be  hereafter, 

But  what  and  where  depend  on  life 's  minute  ? 
Hails  heavenly  cheer  or  infernal  laughter 

Our  first  step  out  of  the  gulf  or  in  it  ? 
Shall  man,  such  step  within  his  endeavor, 

Man 's  face,  have  no  more  play  and  action 
Than  joy  which  is  crystallized  for  ever, 

Or  grief,  an  eternal  petrifaction  ? 


280  ROBERT  BROWNING 

On  which  I  conclude  that  the  early  painters 

To  cries  of  '  Greek  art,  and  what  more  wish  you  ? ' 
Replied:  'To  become  now  self-acquainters, 

And  paint  man  man,  whatever  the  issue ! 
Make  new  hopes  shine  through  the  flesh  they  fray, 

New  fears  aggrandize  the  rags  and  tatters ; 
To  bring  the  invisible  full  into  play ! 

Let  the  visible  go  to  the  dogs — what  matters  ? ' 

Give  these,  I  exhort  you,  their  guerdon  and  glory 

For  daring  so  much,  before  they  well  did  it. 
The  first  of  the  new,  in  our  race 's  story, 

Beats  the  last  of  the  old ;  'tis  no  idle  quiddit. 
The  worthies  began  a  revolution, 

Which  if  on  earth  you  intend  to  acknowledge, 
Why,  honor  them  now !  (ends  my  allocution) 

Nor  confer  your  degree  when  the  folk  leave  college. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

[The  list  is  meant  to  be  suggestive  rather  than  full.  Moreover  it  does  not 
include  books  from  which  selections  have  been  taken  for  the  present  volume, 
unless  these  books  contain  other  important  matter  of  a  similar  kind;  accord- 
ingly the  Bibliography  is  supplemented  by  the  Table  of  Contents.  On  the 
whole  it  has  seemed  better  to  divide  the  titles  into  classes  than  to  give  all  in 
one  alphabetical  series;  but  it  should  be  understood  that  the  divisions  are  not 
everywhere  mutually  exclusive.  The  slightly  varying  use  of  parentheses 
corresponds  in  general  to  a  varying  emphasis,  sometimes  upon  part  of  a  book, 
sometimes  upon  the  whole.] 


I.    The  Greek  Eace  and  Its  Genius 

Arnold,  Matthew.    Hebraism  and  Hellenism.     (In  Culture  and  Anarchy  [etc.]. 

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(Vol.  1,  pp.  149-155.)     London,  1892. 
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Civilization.    London  and  Philadelphia,  1911. 
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The  Genius  of  Greek  Art,  pp.  412-438.)     London,  1877. 
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399.)     London,  1876. 
Thomson,  J.  A.  K.     The  Greek  Tradition.    London,  1915. 
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lichkeit.     (In  Reden  und  Vortrage,  pp.  27-64.    Berlin,  1901.) 
Winckelmann,  Johann  Joachim.     Edle  Einfalt  und  Stille  Grbsse.    Eine  mit 

Goetheschen  und  Herderschen    Worten   eingeleitete  Auswahl   aus  Johann 

Joachim  Winckelmanns  Werke.     Ed.  Walter  Winckelmann.     Berlin,  1909. 
.      Werke,   herausgegeben    von    C.    L.    Fernow,    Heinrich   Meyer,   Johann 

Schulze.     (See  Vol.  8,  Allgemeines  Sachregister,  by  Siebelis,  8.  v.  'Alten,' 

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II.    The  Later  Influence  of  Individual  Ancient  Authors 

Adam,  James.     The  Vitality  of  Platonism,  and   Other  Essays.     Cambridge, 

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Comparetti,  Domenico.    Vergil  in  the  Middle  Ages.    London,  1908. 
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Arnold,  Matthew.     Pagan  and  Mediaeval  Eeligious  Sentiment.     (In  Essays 

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York,  1901. 
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IV.    Antiquity  and  the  Eenaissance 

Burckhardt,  Jacob.  The  Civilization  of  the  Eenaissance  in  Italy.  (Part  3, 
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Bigault,  H.  Histoire  de  la  Querelle  des  Anciens  et  des  Modernes.  (Oeuvres 
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Schneider,  Gustav.  Hellenische  Welt-  und  Lebensanschauungen  in  ihrer 
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Thery,  Atjgustin  FRANgois.  Be  I'Esprit  et  de  la  Critique  LittSraires  ches 
les  Peuples  Anciens  et  Modernes.     2  vols.     Paris,  1832. 

Zielinski,  Thaddaeus.     Our  Debt  to  Antiquity.    London  and  New  York,  1909. 

VI.    The  Classics  and  English  Literature 

Collins,  John  Churton.    Greek  Influence  on  English  Poetry.    London,  1910. 
Gayley,  Charles  M.     The  Classic  Myths  in  English  Literature.    Boston,  1911. 
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1912. 
Murray,  Gilbert.     What  English  Poetry  may  still  Learn  from  Greek.     In 

Essays  and  Studies  by  Members  of  the  English  Association.     Vol.  Ill, 

collected  by  W.  P.  Ker.    Oxford,  1912. 
Quiller-Couch,  Arthur.     On  the  Lineage  of  English  Literature  (II).     (In 

On  the  Art  of  Writing,  pp.  166-190.    Cambridge,  1916.) 
Tucker,  T.  G.     The  Foreign  Debt  of  English  Literature.     London,  1907. 

VII.    The  Classics  and  Particular  Modern  Authors 

Anders,  H.  E.  D.  Shakespeare's  Books,  a  Dissertation  on  Shakespeare's  Bead- 
ing and  the  Immediate  Sources  of  his  Works.    Berlin,  1904. 

Dorrinck,  Alfred.  Die  Lateinischen  Zitate  in  den  Dramen  der  Wichtigsten 
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1907. 

Droop,  Adolph.    Die  Belesenheit  Percy  Bysshe  Shelley's.    Weimar,  1906. 

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Paris,  n.  d.  [f  1896]. 
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Madison,  Wisconsin,  1916. 
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Authors  in  Dante.)     Oxford,  1896. 
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1904. 
Nolhac,  Pierre  de.    Petrarch  and  the  Ancient  World.    Boston,  1907. 
Osgood,  Charles  G.     The  Classical  Mythology  of  Milton's  English  Poems. 

(Yale  Studies  in  English,  No.  VIII.)     New  York,  1900. 
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Starick,  Paul.     Die  Belesenheit  von  John  Keats  und  die  Grundziige  seiner 

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Quarterly   Beview,   Vol.   146,   pp.    384-413    (esp.   pp.   390-404).     London, 

1878. 


VIII.    Miscellaneous 

Boissier,  Gaston.    La  Fin  du  Paganisme.    Third  Edition.    Paris,  1898. 
Botsford,  George  W.,  and  Sihler,  Ernest  G.     Hellenic  Civilisation.     New 

York,  1915. 
Butcher,  S.  H.    Harvard  Lectures  on  Greek  Subjects.    London  and  New  York, 

1904. 
Cooper,  Lane.     Aristotle  on  the  Art  of  Poetry.     An  Amplified  Version,  with 

Supplementary  Illustrations,  for  Students  of  English.  Boston,  1913. 
Hardie,  William  Ross.  Lectures  on  Classical  Subjects.  London,  1903. 
Hatch,  Edwin.     The  Influence  of  Greek  Ideas  and  Usages  upon  the  Christian 

Church.     (The  Hibbert  Lectures,  1888.)     Eighth  edition.    London,  1901. 
Jardf,,  A.    La  Grice  Antique  et  la  Vie  Grecque.    Paris,  1914. 
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Rechts  fiir  die  Moderne  Welt,  Vol.  1,  pp.  1-16;  Das  Wesen  des  Romischen 

Geistes,  Vol.  1,  pp.  318-340.)     Fourth  edition.    Leipzig,  1878. 
Smyth,  Herbert  Weir    [Editor],     Harvard  Lectures   on   Classical  Subjects. 

Boston  and  New  York,  1912. 
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Civilization.    London  and  Philadelphia,  1913. 
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Greece.    Third  Series,  pp.  339-364.    London  and  New  York,  1898.) 


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tur  der  Gegenwart,  herausgegeben  von  Paul  Hinneberg.  Teil  I,  Abteilung 
VIII.) 

IX.    Bibliographical 

Betz,  Louis-P.     La  Literature  Comparie.     Essai  Bibliographique.      (L'An- 

tiquite  Grecque  et  Bomaine  .  .  .  dans  les  Litteratures  Modernes,  pp.  281- 

338.)     Second  edition,  Strassburg,  1904. 
Harris,  William  J.    The  First  Printed  Translations  into  English  of  the  Great 

Foreign  Classics.    London  and  New  York,  [1909]. 
Palmer,  Henrietta  B.     List  of  English  Editions  and  Translations  of  Greek 

and  Latin  Classics  Printed  before  1641.    London,  1911. 


INDEX 


INDEX  OF  PROPER  NAMES 


[The  titles  listed  in  the  Bibliography  (pp.  281-285)  are  not  included  in 
this  Index.  References  to  a  few  proper  adjectives  are  included,  but  those  to 
'Greek'  and  'the  Greeks'  are  omitted.] 


Abraham,  248 

Abraham  a  Sancta  Clara,  256 

Abridged  History  of  Greek  Literature, 

An,  of  Alfred  and  Maurice  Croiset, 

136  n.,  141  n. 
Abyssinia,  204 
Academe.    See  Academy,  The 
Academics,  The,  48 
Academy,  The,  47,  58 
Acarnania,  34 
Achaea,  34 

Achaean  League,  The,  257 
Achaeans,  The,  35,  85,  152 
Acheron,  River,  207 
Achilles,  35,  141,  153,  191 
Achilles  Tatius,  219 
Acrocorinthus,  29 
Acropolis,  The,  of  Athens,  29,  58,  59, 

71,  73 
Adam,  209  n. 
Addison,  Joseph,  218 
Adonis,  207 
Advancement    of    Learning,    The,    of 

of  Francis  Bacon,  191 
Aegean  islands,  The,  52,  73 
Aegean  Sea,  The,  34,  36,  47,  50,  51, 

52,  71 
Aegeon,  93 
Aegina,  Gulf  of  (=  'Saronic  waves'), 

53 
Aegisthus,  7,  12,  13,  136 
Aeneas,  187,  209  n. 
Aeneas  Silvius,  188 
Aeneid,  The,  of  Virgil,  1,  95  n.,  209  n., 

210  n.,  212  n., 


Aeolians,  The,  114,  115,  116 

Aeschines,  80 

Aeschylus,  8,  9,  37,  40,  43,  58,  64,  82, 

109,  140,  140  n.,  146,  146  n.,  150  n., 

170,   175,   177,   179,   181,   183,   195, 

219,  263 
Aesop,  90 
Aetolia,  34 
Africa,  57,  59,  117 
Agamemnon,  12,  40,  136,  191,  200 
Agamemnon,   The,   of   Aeschylus,   40, 

170 
Agariste,  66 
Agassiz,  Louis,  10 
Agatharchides,  177 
Age  of  Pericles,  The,  of  Sir  Richard 

Jebb,  63 
Agora,  The,  50,  56,  58,  243 
Agricola,  Rudolphus,  190 
Ajax,  141,  142 

A  jax,  The,  of  Sophocles,  141  n.,  142  n. 
Albanians,  The,  253 
Alcaeus,  175,  177,  251,  257 
Alcides.     See  Heracles 
Alcmaeonidae,  The,  66 
Alcman,  37,  39,  43,  175,  179 
Alexander,  The  Dying,  278 
Alexander  the  Great,  4,  19,  31,  33,  47, 

102,   110,   116,  164,   166,  177,  247, 

252,  259 
Alexandria,  3,  54,  112,  167,  175,  220 
Alexandrian  age,   The,  95,   171,   173, 

174,  183,  221,  222,  223 
Allinson,  Anne  C.  E.,  34 
Allinson,  Francis  G.,  34 


290 


INDEX 


Alpheus,  River,  207 
Alps,  The,  28 
Amalek,  187 
Amalthea,  204 
Amara,  Mount,  204 
Amata,  187 

America.    See  United  States  of  Amer- 
ica, The 
American  Journal  of  Philology,  132  n. 
Americanism  and  Hellenism  of  Basil 

L.  Gildersleeve,  243 
Amiens,  4 

Aminta,  The,  of  Tasso,  219 
Ammon,  203 
Ammonius,  267 
Amphiaraus,  89 
Amphilochus,  89 

Anaxagoras,  50,  59,  64,  66,  74,  176 
Ancient    Classical    Drama,    The,    of 

Richard  G.  Moulton,  132  n. 
Ancient    Greek    Historians,    The,    of 

J.  B.  Bury,  141  n. 
Andocides,  58,  177 
Andria,  The,  of  Terence,  127  n. 
Andromachus,  59 
Andronicus,  124 
Animalia,  The,  of  Aristotle,  10 
Annales,  The,  of  Ennius,  124 
Anne,  Queen  of  England,  25 
Antaeus,  205 

Anthology,  The  Greek,  44,  221 
Anthology,  The  Latin,  185 
Antigone,  136,  138,  243 
Antigone,  The,  of  Sophocles,  13,  14, 

14  n.,  82,  137,  138  n.,  139  n.,  151  n., 

154,  154  n. 
Antiphon,  177 
Antisthenes,  182 
Antony,  Mark,  168 
Antonines,  The,  128,  250 
Anytus,  127 
Apelles,  220 
Aphrodite,  143,  144,  145,  182,  209  n., 

210  n. 
Apollo,  38,  41,  47,  153,  154,  200,  251, 

271.  278 


Apollo  Belvedere,  The,  26 

Apollonius,   206 

Apophthegmata  Laconica  of  Plutarch, 
91  n. 

Apotres,  Les,  of  Renan,  96  n. 

Appian  Way,  The,  121 

Appius  Claudius  Caecus,  121,  125 

Apuleius,  207  n.,  220 

Aquinas,  Thomas,  4,  187 

Arabia,  60 

Arabs,  The,  235,  267 

Arachova,  45 

Arcades  of  Milton,  207 

Arcadia,  34,  45,  50,  135 

Arden,  210 

Areopagus,  The,  58,  67 

Arethusa,  207 

Argos,  50,  136 

Argos,  Gulf  of,  92  n. 

Argolis,  34 

Arion,  245 

Ariosto,  Lodovico,  220 

Aristides,  64 

Aristophanes,  10,  41,  42,  64,  80  n.,  82, 
126,  170,  181,  243,  250,  251,  258, 
263 

Aristophanes  of  Byzantium,  173 

Aristotle,  5,  11,  12,  27,  59,  83,  87, 
87  n.,  97  n.,  102,  112,  130,  130  n., 
138,  140,  141,  141  n.,  142,  156,  157, 
158,  159,  161,  162,  166,  181,  185, 
186,  189,  221,  237 

Aristotle 's  Theory  of  Poetry  and  Fine 
Art  of  S.  H.  Butcher,  139  n.,  140  n. 

Armenia,  59 

Armenians,  The,  262 

Arnold,  Matthew,  6,  8,  244,  251,  260 

Arnold,  Thomas,  196,  197 

Artaxerxes,  48 

Artemis,  41,  42,  143,  144,  145,  207 

Artemis  Prologizes  of  Robert  Brown- 
ing, 144  n. 

Aryans,  The,  9,  262  n.,  264.  See  also 
Indo-European  peoples,  The 

Ascanius,  187 

Ascham,  Roger,  190,  191,  193,  194 


INDEX 


291 


Asclepieion,   The,   45 

Asclepius,  10 

Ascra,  87 

Asia,  28 

Asia  Minor,  28,  52,  54,  61,  85,  87,  114, 
115 

Asiatics,  The,  87 

Assyrians,  The,  175 

Astraea,  186 

Athena,  5,  26,  72,  75,  134,  141,  142, 
207,  210  n. 

Athena,  Temple  of,  71,  72 

Athenaeus,  89  n.,  147  n.,  180,  194 

Athenians,  The,  7,  28,  40,  53,  55,  59, 
63,  64,  66,  68,  69,  70,  71,  73,  77,  79, 
80,  81,  82,  83,  84,  86,  87,  90,  91,  114, 
115,  134,  135,  149,  178,  250 

Athens,  2,  24,  29,  30,  31,  33,  34,  45, 
47,  49,  49  n.,  50,  52,  53,  54,  55,  56, 
57,  58,  59,  60,  61,  62,  63,  64,  65,  66, 
67,  70,  71,  72,  73,  74,  75,  78,  79,  83, 
90,  92  n.,  102,  103,  115,  116,  127, 
134,  173,  175,  220,  246,  249 

Athos,  Mount,  34 

Atlantis,  24,  243 

Atridae,  The,  139,  150 

Atreus,  The  son  of  (=  Agamemnon), 
12 

Attalus,  57 

Attica,  31,  34,  35,  50,  51,  52,  60,  66, 
71,  87,  114,  115,  116,  253 

Attic  Theatre,  The,  of  A.  E.  Haigh, 
77  n. 

Atticum,  Ad,  of  Cicero,  90  n. 

Attitude  of  the  Greek  Tragedians 
toward  Nature,  The,  of  Henry  R. 
Fairclough,  36  n. 

Augustine,  Saint,  1,  122,  122  n.,  185, 
189 

Augustus  Caesar,  57,  186 

Aurora,  208,  215,  215  n. 

Babylonians,  The,  99 
Bacchus.     See  Dionysus 
Bacchylides,  140,  140  n.,  147  n.,  151  n., 
251 


Bacon,   Francis,   191,    192,    193,    196, 

201,  220,  225 
Bacon,  Roger,  4 
Balkans,  The,  28 

Barbour-Page  Foundation,  The,  243  n. 
Barstow,  Marjorie  L.,  156,  156  n. 
Basil  the  Great,  56,  61,  62 
Baths  of  Caracalla,  The,  10 
Beatrice,  4,  5,  186 
Bekker,  Immanuel,  57  n. 
Bellum   Poenicum,    The,    of   Naevius, 

124 
Bema,  The,  243 
Bembo,  Pietro,  192 
Bentley,  Richard,  196 
Bergk,  Theodor,  89  n.,  97  n.,  135  n. 
Bernard,  Saint,  4 
Berni,  Francesco,  221 
Bethlehem  Hospital,  26 
Bible,  The,  25,  187,  213,  235 
Bibliotheca,  The,  of  Photius,  175,  176 
Bikelas,  Dimitrios,  258 
Birds,  The,  of  Aristophanes,  10 
Bithynia,  59 

Black  Sea,  The,  29,  52,  73,  117 
Blackwell,  Thomas,  196 
Blouet,  Paul.    See  O'Rell,  Max 
Boccaccio,  219 
Bochart,  Samuel,  201 
Boeckh,  August,  57  n.,  98,  98  n. 
Boeotia,  29,  31,  50,  51,  91,  251 
Boeotians,  The,  87,  91 
Boethius,  185 
Bohemians,  The,  253 
Boiardo,  Matteo  Maria,  220 
Bonmattei,  77  n. 
Book   of   Snobs,   The,   of   Thackeray, 

255 
Botticelli,  220 
Brahmins,  The,  264 
Brescia,  187 
Briareus,  93 
Britain,  52,  178 
British  Museum,  The,  25,  172 
Browning,  Robert,  144  n.,  278 
Brutus,  54 


292 


INDEX 


Brutus,  The,  of  Cicero,  91  n. 

Bryce,  James,  Viscount,  244 

Bryn  Mawr  College,  1  n. 

Buchanan,  George,  193 

Buddhism,  266 

Bude,  Guillaume,  190 

Bunyan,  John,  276 

Burke,  Edmund,  196 

Bury,  J.  B.,  141,  141  n. 

Butcher,  Samuel  Henry,  13  n.,  139  n., 
140,  140  n.,  145,  145  n. 

Butler,  Arthur  John,  4  n. 

Butler,  Nicholas  Murray,  244 

Bywater,  Ingram,  138  n. 

Byzantines,  The,  91 

Byzantium,  182,  185.  See  also  Con- 
stantinople 

Cadmus,  203 

Caesar.      See    Augustus    Caesar    and 

Julius  Caesar 
Caiadas,  259 
Calderon,  95 

Caliph  of  Bagdad,  The,  175 
Callimachus,  168 
Callistratus,  249 
Calunnia,  The,  of  Botticelli,  220 
Calverley,  Charles  Stuart,  44  n. 
Calypso,  153 

Campagna,  The  Eoman,  31 
Campanella,  220 

Campanile  of  Florence,  The,  279 
Capella,  Martianus,  197 
Cappadocia,  60,  178 
Cappadocians,  The,  50 
Captains  Courageous  of  Kipling,  245 
Capture    of   Miletus,    The,    of    Phry- 

nichus,  82 
Caracalla,  10 
Caria,  102 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  275,  276 
Carneades,  59 
Carr,  Nicholas,  191 
Carthaginians,  The,  99 
Casaubon,  Isaac,  194 
Case  for  the   Classics,   The,  of  Paul 

Shorey,  183  n. 


Cassiodorus,  185 

Cassius,  54 

Castalia,  203,  204 

Catherine  II  of  Bussia,  236 

Cato,  'the  Censor,'  96 n.,  125,  185 

Celestial  Hierarchy,   The,   of  pseudo- 

Dionysius,  186,  220 
Celsus,  61 

Celtic  peoples,  The,  262 
Century  Dictionary,  The,  133 
Cephalion,  177 
Cephissia,  61 
Cephissus,  Eiver,  58 
Ceramicus,  The,  58 
Ceres.    See  Demeter 
Ceylon,  Island  of,  262 
Chaeronea,  64 
Chalybeans,  The,  206  n. 
Cham,  203 
Chaos,  206,  209 
Chapelain,  Jean,  193 
Character  of  the  Happy   Warrior  of 

Wordsworth,  19 
Characters,  The,  of  Theophrastus,  11, 

12,  15,  15  n. 
Charlemagne,  185 
Chartres,  185,  188 
Chartres  Cathedral,  9 
Charybdis,  207,  211 
Chatham,  Earl  of.    See  Pitt,  William, 

the  elder 
Chaucer,  1 

Chesterton,  Gilbert  K.,  269,  269  n. 
Chicago,  248 
China,  23 
Chinese,  The,  252 
Christ,  2,  3,  163,  205,  205  n.,  207,  209, 

270,  277 
Christian  Church,  The,  162,  184,  185, 

218 
Christianity,  3,  5,  104,  107,  111,  118, 

130,   162,   165,   193,   200,   201,  202, 

235,   250,   259,   264,   265,   270,   271, 

272,  273,  274,  275,  276,  277 
Christians,  The,  54,  228,  265,  268 
Christmas,  45,  271 


INDEX 


293 


Chryses,  200 

Chrysippus,  son  of  Pelops,  139 

Chrysippus  the  Stoic,  176 

Chrysostom,  Saint,  107 

Cicero,  54,  77,  89,  90  n.,  91,  91  n., 
92  n.,  120,  120  n.,  121,  121  n.,  122, 
122  n.,  125,  125  n.,  126,  126  n.,  163, 
184,  185,  188,  189,  190,  191,  192, 
194,  197,  219,  221,  237,  248 

Cilicia,  61 

Cimabue,  4 

Cimon,  49,  50,  58 

Cinyras,  187 

Circe,  153,  207,  208 

City  Dionysia,  The,  78,  79 

Civitate  Dei,  Be,  of  Saint  Augustine, 
122  n. 

Classical  Mythology  of  Milton's  Eng- 
lish Poems,  The,  of  Charles  G. 
Osgood,  199  n. 

Classical  Weekly,  The,  156  n. 

Classics  and  the  Elective  System,  The, 
of  E.  M.  Wenley,  183  n. 

Classics  in  European  Education,  The, 
of  Edward  Kennard  Band,  183 

Claudian,  201 

Cleanthes,  53,  55,  60 

Cleon,  90 

Clisthenes,  67 

Clouds,  The,  of  Aristophanes,  10,  41, 
42,  126 

Clytemnestra,  40,  136 

'Colax,'  The,  254 

Colonus,  41,  162 

'Come  down,  O  maid,'  of  Tennyson, 
223 

Compassion,  151 

Comus,  207,  207  n.,  208 

Comus  of  Milton,  205,  206,  207,  211, 
211  n. 

Constantino,  167 

Constantinople,    127,    181,    188.      See 

also  Byzantium 
Constitution   of  Athens,   The,  of  the 

Old  Oligarch,  170 
Cook,  Albert  S.,  199  n. 


Corinna,  182 

Corinth,  159,  161 

Corinth,  Gulf  of,  30 

Corneille,  95 

Cornell  University,  156 

Cornford,  F.  M.,  152,  153  n. 

Corot,  204 

Coruncanius,  Tiberius,  121 

Cosmo,  Saint,  45 

Cotytto,  207 

Council  of  the  Areopagus,  The,  67 

Cowper,  William,  148,  148  n. 

Cremona,  187 

Creon,  13,  137,  138,  160,  161,  243 

Crete,  35,  121,  122 

Croesus,  153,  169 

Croiset,    Alfred,    85  n.,    136,    136  n., 

141  n. 
Croiset,  Maurice,  6,  85,  85  n.,  136  n., 

141  n. 
Cromwell,  Oliver,  275 
Crown,  On  the,  of  Demosthenes,  135, 

135  n. 
Ctesias,  176 
Cults  of  the  Greek  States  of  Farnell, 

151  n.,  153  n. 
Cupid,  207,  207  n. 
Cupids,  220 
Curio,  187 

Curius,  Mannius,  121 
Curtius,  Ernst,  247 
Curtius,  Quintus,  247 
Cyclopes,  The,  93 
Cyclops,  The   (Polyphemus),  153 
Cyllene,  Mount,  207 
Cyme,  91 

Cynics,  The,  182,  256 
Cyprian,  The.    See  Aphrodite 
Cypris.    See  Aphrodite 
Cyprus,  59,  73 
Cyrene,  73 

Dabney,  Virginius,  252 
Dacier,  Anne,  194 
Damiano,  Saint,  45 
Dana'e,  The,  of  Euripides,  82 
Danai,  The,  85 


294 


INDEX 


Dante,  1,  4,  186,  187,  196,  214 

Daphne,  203,  204 

Dauphin,   The    (son  of  Louis  XIV), 

195 
David,  187 
Dawn,  The,  214,  215 
Death  of  a  Fair  Infant,  On  the,  of 

Milton,  211  n. 
Debussy,  Claude  Achille,  26 
Delos,  Island  of,  38,  71 
Delphi,  139,  159,  178 
Demeter,  46,  203,  228,  263 
Demetrius,  Saint,  46 
Democritus,  151 
Demosthenes,  58,  79,  82,  135,  135  n., 

164,  166,  178,  179,  181,  186,  191, 

219 
De  Quincey,  Thomas,  139,  140  n. 
De   Quincey,   Thomas,    The   Collected 

Works  of,  140  n. 
Desmarets  de  Saint  Sorlin,  Jean,  193 
DiabolS,  The,  of  Apelles,  220 
Dialogues,  The,  of  Plato,  44,  251 
Diana.    See  Artemis 
Dicaearchus,  176 
Dickens,  Charles,  244,  272 
Dickinson,  G.  Lowes,   269,   270,   273, 

274,  277 
Dictionary  of  Greek  and  Boman  Biog- 
raphy   and    Mythology    of    Smith, 

10  n. 
Dido,  209  n. 
Didymus,  168,  173,  179 
Dies  Irae,  The,  219 
Diogenes,  96  n. 
Diodorus,  176,  201 
Dion  of  Wordsworth,  223 
Dionysia,  The  City,  78,  79 
Dionysius,  Saint,  45 
Dionysius.     See  pseudo-Dionysius 
Dionysus,  41,  43,  45,  69,  78,  204,  207 
Dionysus,  The  altar  of,  82 
Dionysus,  Theatre  of,  78 
Diophantus,  60 
Dioscuri,  The,  58 
Diotima,  5 


Diphilus,  81 

Dirce,  172 

Dis,  203 

Divine  Comedy,  The,  of  Dante,  4 

Dodona,  35 

Donatus,  185 

Don  Miff  of  Virginius  Dabney,  252 

Dorat,  Jean,  190 

Dorians,   The,   35,   90,   91,    114,   115, 

116,  119,  265 
Doris,  114 
Downfall,  The  (La  DSbdcle),  of  Zola, 

133,  133  n. 
Draco,  120 

Duff,  J.  Wight,  128  n. 
Du  Maurier,  George,  251,  252 
Duns  Scotus,  197 

Earth,  14,  263 

Easter,  271 

Eastern  Eoman  Empire,  The,  167,  185, 

186 
Ecclesiazusae,   The,   of   Aristophanes, 

80  n. 
Echo,  207 

Eden,  203,  204,  272 
Education,  Of,  of  Milton,  191 
Education,  On,  of  Plutarch,  219 
Egypt,  28,  73,  262 
Egyptians,  The,  99,  248,  254 
Electra,  The,  of  Sophocles,  145  n. 
Elias,  Saint,  45 
Elinor,  in  The  Prophetic  Pictures  of 

Hawthorne,  137 
Eliot,  George,  245 
Elizabethans,  The,  181 
Elyot,  Sir  Thomas,  190,  191 
Empedocles,  175,  182 
Encyclopaedic  und  Methodologie  der 

Philologischen     Wissenschaften     of 

August  Boeckh,  98  n. 
England,  1,  33,  56,  95,  190,  195,  196, 

236,  251 
English,  The,  51,  55,  253,  254 
English  Club  of  Bryn  Mawr  College, 

The,  In. 
Enna,  203 


INDEX 


295 


Ennius,  124,  125,  184 

Ephesus,  169 

Ephorus,  176 

Epicureans,  The,  48 

Epicurus,  59,  60 

Epidaurus,  10,  203 

Epiphanius,  60 

Epirus,  35 

Epitome  of  Galen,  The,  of  Oribasius, 

179 
Er,  145,  201  n. 
Erasmus,  190,  191,  193,  194 
Eratosthenes,  176 
Erectheum,  The,  170 
Erinyes,  The,  136,  146 
Erotic  fragment,  Alexandrian,  182 
Erymanthus,  Mount,  207 
Eryximachus,  257 
Essays  and  Addresses  of  Sir  Kichard 

Jebb,  63  n. 
Eteo-Cretans,  The,  35 
Etruscans,  The,  127,  128 
Euboic  Sea,  The,  202 
Eumenides,  The,  of  Aeschylus,  150  n. 
Eunapius,  54,  55 
Eunomia,  147  n. 
Eupatridae,  The,  66 
Euphorion,  184 
Euphuism,  221 
Euripides,  36,  41,  42,  43,  44,  64,  80, 

82,  83,  92  n.,  105,  139  n.,  143,  151, 

151  n.,  154,  154  n.,  168  n.,  171,  172, 

173,  174,  175,  179,  181,  219,  256 
Euripides,  the  younger,  174 
Euripidis  Opera  Omnia,  179 
Europe,  2,  3,  4,  28,  30,  34,  50,  112, 

128,  184,  192,   198,  233,  235,   236, 

252,  253,  266,  270 
Europeans,  The,  87 
Eusebius,  61,  201 
Eustathius,  178 

Euxine  Sea.     See  Black  Sea,  The 
Evadne,  39 

Evans,  Sir  Arthur,  169 
Evans,  Mary  Ann  (=  George  Eliot), 

245 


Eve,  202,  208,  209  n. 

Excursion,  The,  of  Wordsworth,  222 

Fable,  A,  of  Cowper,  148  n. 
Fabius  Maximus  'Cunctator,'  125 
Fabius  Maximus  'Pictor,'  122,  125 
Fabricius,  121 

Faery  Queene,  The,  of  Spenser,  207  n. 
Fairbanks,  Arthur,  151,  152  n. 
Fairclough,  Henry  E.,  36'n. 
Farnell,   Lewis   E.,    151,   151  n.,   153, 

153  n. 
Farnesina,  The,  220 
Fatalism    of    the    Greeks    of    Abby 

Leach,  132  n. 
Fates,  The,  146,  151 
Fenelon,  194 
Ferrero,  Guglielmo,  248 
Feuilles  d'Automne  of  Victor  Hugo, 

94  n. 
Ffolliott,  218 
Ficino,  Marsilio,  220 
Finland,  Gulf  of,  229 
Flacco,  Pro,  of  Cicero,  90  n. 
Florence,  4,  187 
Florida,  247 

Fox,  Charles  James,  195 
France,  3,  95,  190,  193,  195,  236,  275 
Franklin,  Benjamin,  260 
Frederick  the  Great,  236,  275 
Frederick  II,  Emperor,  4 
Freeman,  Edward  Augustus,  248,  257 
French,  The,  253,  254 
French  Eevolution,  The,  271 
From  Religion  to  Philosophy  of  F.  M. 

Cornford,  153  n. 
Funeral    Oration,    The,    put    into    the 

mouth  of   Pericles  by  Thucydides, 

58,  63,  65,  69,  134 

Gades,  178 

Gaines,  Charles  Kelsey,  244 
Galen,  179 

Galeerenhafen,  The,  229 
Gallipoli,  56,  57 
Gardner,  Percy,  252 
Gaul,  117 


296 


INDEX 


Gauls,  The,  50 

Gellius,  Aulus,  128  n.,  189 

Germanic  peoples,  The,  94,  129,  130, 

262 
Germans,  The,  92,  112,  218,  221,  253, 

254,  255 
Germany,  3,  34,  102,  163  n.,  196,  197, 

228,  251 
Geschichte  der  Bomischen  Bepublik  of 

K.  W.  Nitzsch,  123  n. 
Gettysburg,  Speech  at,  of  Lincoln,  223 
Gibbon,  Edward,  175,  195 
Gildersleeve,    Basil   L.,    98  n.,    132  n., 

140,  140  n.,  243,  243  n. 
Giotto,  4,  279 
Girard,  Jules,  96,  96  n. 
Giulio  Bomano,  220 
Glasgow,  63  n. 
Glaucus,  154 
Glory  of  the  Imperfect,  The,  of  George 

Herbert  Palmer,  6  n. 
Glory  that  Was  Greece,  The,  of  J.  C. 

Stobart,  25  n. 
Gloucester,  Mass.,  245 
Godfrey  of  Bouillon,  197 
Goethe,  39,  67,  109,  118,  163,  196,  236 
Goettinger  Nachrichten,  182 
Goliath,  187 
Gongorism,  221 
Gorgias,  59 
Governour,     Boole     of     the,     of     Sir 

Thomas  Elyot,  190 
Gozo,  51 

Graces,  The,  203,  204,  207,  209  n. 
Graeco-Boman  world,  The,  261 
Great  Britain,  67 
Greece,  1,  3,  4,  5,  10,  12,  23,  24,  25, 

26,  27,  28,  29,  30,  31,  34,  35,  45,  47, 

50,  52,  57,  60,  61,  63,  64,  72,  75,  79, 

85,  86,  90,  91,  95,  96  n.,  97  n.,  99, 

102,   106,   115,   116,   121,   123,   159, 

163,   168,   183,   202,   229,   236,   246, 

248,   249,  250,   254,   257,   258,   259, 

261,  262  n.,  263,  267 
Greek    Gift    to   Civilisation,    The,    of 

Samuel  Lee  Wolff,  218 


Greek  Lands  and  Letters  of  Francis 
G.  Allinson  and  Anne  C.  E.  Allin- 
son,  34  n. 

Greek  Reader  of  Wilamowitz-Moellen- 
dorff,  237 

Green,  Thomas  Hill,  63 

Gregory  Nazianzen,  54,  56,  61,  62 

Grenfell,  Bernard  P.,  172,  182 

Griechische  und  Lateinische  Literatur 
und  Sprache,  Die,  of  Wilamowitz- 
Moellendorff  and  others,  163  n. 

Grote,  George,  66,  256 

Guarino,  Battista,  188,  189,  190,  191, 
192 

Guido  Eeni,  213  n. 

Hades,  245 

Hadrian,  Emperor,  59,  117,  127 

Haemon,  13,  243 

Haigh,  Arthur  Elam,  8,  9  n.,  77,  77  n. 

Hall,  Captain  Basil,  244 

Hamlet  of  Shakespeare,  162 

Hartlib,  Samuel,  191 

Harvard  Lectures  on  Greek  Subjects 
of  S.  H.  Butcher,  145  n. 

Harvard  University,  183  n. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  137 

Hebrews,  The.    See  Jews,  The 

Hecate,  207 

Hecatonchires,  The,  93 

Hector,  153,  191,  278 

Heffelbower,  George  F.,  136  n.,  141  n. 

Hegel,  71 

Heidelberg,  54 

Helen,  210  n.,  245 

Helicon,  Mount,  31 

Helios,  213 

Hellas,  27,  46,  64,  65,  102,  114,  134, 
178,  218,  246,  247,  258 

Hellas  and  Hesperia  of  Basil  L.  Gil- 
dersleeve, 98  n.,  243  n. 

Hellas  of  Shelley,  23,  23  n.,  24  n. 

Hellen,  116 

Hellenes,  The,  35,  36,  100,  107,  134, 
135,  249,  258 

Hellenica,  The,  of  Theopompus,  176 


INDEX 


297 


Helvetius,  230 

Henley,  William  Ernest,  253 

Henry  IV  of  Shakespeare,  70 

1  Henry  IV  of  Shakespeare,  71  n. 

S  Henry  VI  of  Shakespeare,  148  n. 

Henry  VII  of  Germany,  186 

Henry  VIII  of  Shakespeare,  149  n. 

Hephaestion   (t  of  Alexandria),  180 

Hephaestion  of  Athens,  55,  60 

Hephaestus,  40,  201,  207,  263 

Hera,  152,  201,  210  n.,  211,  215,  264 

Heraclea,  60 

Heracles,   146,   187,   202,   205,   205  n., 

265 
Heraclitus,  139,  175,  181 
Hercher,  Rudolf,  180 
Hercules.    See  Heracles 
Herder,  183,  196 

Herdsman,  The,  in  Oedipus  Bex,  160 
Heretics    of    Gilbert    K.    Chesterton, 

269  n. 
Hermes,    12,    13,    37,    89,    136,    153, 

209  n.,  211 

Hermes,  The,  of  Praxiteles,  9,  169 

Hermione,  203 

Hermon,  comic  actor,  81 

Herodes  Atticus,  61 

Herodian,  179 

Herodotus,  64,  74,  89,  90,  90  n.,  141, 

144,  153  n.,  169,  176,  177,  186,  197, 

246,  247 
Herondas,  170 
Hesiod,    15,    87,    88,    152,    206,    209, 

210  n.,  214,  220 
Hesperia,  243,  258 
Hesperides,  The,  204,  207 
Hestia,  200,  208,  263 
Hicks,  Edward  Lee,  169 
Hiero,  255 

Hilary,  Saint,  59 
Hildebert  of  Tours,  185 
Himerius,  177 
Hindus,  The,  92,  247,  262 
Hinneberg,  Paul,  163  n. 
Hippodamia,  148 
Hippolytus,  42,  143,  145 


Hippolytus,   The,   of   Euripides,    144, 

144  n. 
Histoire  de  la  Litterature  Grecque  of 

Alfred   and   Maurice   Croiset,    6  n., 

85  n. 
Histoire    des    Religions    de    la    Grdce 

Antique  of  Alfred  Maury,  261  n. 
Historical    Sketches    of    John    Henry 

Newman,  49  n. 
History  of  Greek  Literature  of  K.  O. 

Miiller,  258 
History     of     Latin     Christianity    of 

Henry  Hart  Milman,  133  n. 
History    of    the    Diadochi,    The,    of 

Agatharchides,  176 
Hittites,  The,  248 
Holland,  190 

Holy  Field  of  Pisa,  The,  4 
Homer,  1,  6,  12,  31,  36,  37,  47,  151, 

152,   163,   181,   183,   184,   186,   188, 

191,  194,  196,  200,  201,  206,  209  n., 

210  n.,  214,  215,  219,  220,  221,  223, 

237,  245,  247 
Homeric  Hymn  to  Aphrodite,  The,  174 
Homeric  Hymn  to  Apollo,  The,  174 
Horace,  54,  124,  124  n.,  163,  184,  196, 

201,  209  n.,  219,  237,  256 
Hours,  The,  203,  204,  207,  214,  215, 

217 
How  long  halt  ye?  of  G.  Lowes  Dick- 
inson, 270 
Hufeland,  230 
Hugo,  Victor,  94  n. 
Humphreys,  Milton  Wylie,  254 
Hunt,  Arthur  S.,  172 
Hutchinson,  Thomas,  23  n. 
Hymettus,  Mount,  31,  34,  47,  51 
Hymne   in   Honour  of  Love,   An,   of 

Spenser,  207  n. 
Hymn    to    Aphrodite,    The    Homeric, 

174,  209  n. 
Hymn  to  Apollo,  The  Homeric,  174 
Hymn  to  Zeus  of  Cleanthes,  53 
Hypatia,  267 
Hyperides,  177,  178 
Hypsipyle,  The,  of  Euripides,  172 


298 


INDEX 


Iceland,  262 

Ictinus,  64,  74 

Ida,  Mount,  40 

Idyls,  The,  of  Theocritus,  44 

Iliad,  The,  of  Homer,  35,  38,  86,  89, 

151,  151  n.,  152,  152  n.,  154,  154  n., 

200,     200  n.,     201,     201  n.,     209  n., 

210  n.,  215,  215  n. 
Hios.    See  Ilium 
Ilium,  35,  37,  38,  43 
Ilissus,  The,  44,  47,  59 
Illyria,  117,  203 

II  Penseroso  of  Milton,  206,  207 
Independent  Beview,  The,  270 
India,  93,  94,  106,  247,  264,  265 
Indians,  The  East,  99,  261 
Indica,  The,  of  Ctesias,  176 
Indo-European  peoples,  The,  99,  261, 

262,  263.    See  also,  Aryans,  The 
Indo-Germanic  races,  The,  9 
Iole,  146 

Ionia,  59,  66,  88,  102,  115 
Ionians,  The,  8,  35,  49,  51,  66,  82,  87, 

90,  114,  115,  116,  119 
Iphigenia    among    the    Taurians    of 

Euripides,  151  n. 
Iphigenia  in  Aulis,  of  Euripides,  173, 

174 
Irassa,  205 
Iris,  207 
Isaeus,  177,  178 
Isidore  of  Gaza,  267 
Islam,  167,  267 
'Ismenian  steep,'  The,  205 
Isocrates,  177 
Issachar,  247 
Ithaca,  245 

Italians,  The,  208  n.,  253 
Italiots,  The,  262 
Italy,  28,  29,  30,  31,  59,  115,  117,  120, 

121,  127,  186,  190,  193,  219 
Italy,  Southern,  220 

Jack  the  Ripper,  254 
Jacobinism,  270 
Japan,  23,  275 
Japanese,  The,  275 


Jason,  245 

Jebb,    Sir    Richard,    13  n.,    15  n.,    63, 

63  n.,   137  n.,   138  n.,   140  n.,   141  n., 

147  n.,  149  n. 
Jerome,  Saint,   189 
Jerusalem,  Delivered  of  Tasso,  219 
Jesse,  187 
Jesuits,  The,  195 
Jews,  The,  8,  99,  106,  267 
Job,  The  Book  of,  213  n. 
Jocasta,  161 

John  of  Luxemburg,  187 
John  of  Salisbury,  185 
John,  Saint,  Knights  of,  45 
John  the  Scot.     See  Duns  Scotus 
Johnson,   Samuel,  253 
Joshua,  186 
Journey    Round    my    Garden    of    Al- 

phonse  Karr,  246 
Jove.     See  Zeus 
Jowett,  Benjamin,  14  n.,  134  n. 
Joy,  207,  207  n. 
Jubal,  254 
Judea,  262 
Julian,  commissioner  of  the  land-tax, 

61 
Julian,  Emperor,  61,  178,  179,  268 
Julius  Caesar,  33,  187,  197 
Juno.     See  Hera 
Jupiter.    See  Zeus 
Justice,  147  n.,  151 
Justinian,  167 
Juvenal,  86,  86  n.,  253 

Kaine   Historie,   The,   of   Ptolemaios, 

180 
Karaiskakis  Place,  45 
Karr,  Alphonse,  246 
Karytaena,  Castle  of,  45 
Keats,  25,  26,  222 
Kelsey,  Francis  W.,  183  n. 
Kipling,  Rudyard,  245 
Knights  of  St.  John,  45 
Kock,  Karl  Theodor,  146  n. 
Kohn,  Josef,  153,  153  n. 
Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  Die,  edited  by 

Paul  Hinneberg,  163  n. 


INDEX 


299 


Labdacidae,  The,  150 

Lacaenarum  Apophthegmata  of  Plu- 
tarch, 91  n. 

Lacedaemonians,  The,  248 

Laconia,  247 

Ladoga,  Lake  of,  229 

Ladon,  River,  207 

Laius,  139,  149,  159,  160,  161 

L' Allegro  of  Milton,  207,  212  n. 

Lammetrie,  230 

Lang,  Andrew,  13  n. 

Langeais,  197 

Laocoon,  26 

Laodamia  of  Wordsworth,  223 

Latin  and  Greek  in  American  Educa- 
tion, edited  by  Francis  W.  Kelsey, 
183  n. 

Latins,  The,  187 

Latium,  127,  186 

Laurium,  52,  71 

Laws,  The,  of  Plato,  257 

Leach,  Abby,  132,  132  n.,  153  n. 

Lear,  King,  139 

Leaves  of  Grass  of  Walt  Whitman, 
244 

Leech-Gatherer,  The,  of  Wordsworth, 
223 

Leleges,  The,  35 

Lemnos,  Island  of,  41 

Lenaea,  The,  78,  79 

Leontion,  182 

Lesbos,  Island  of,  39,  59 

Lessing,  196 

Letronne,  Jean  Antoine,  268 

Lewes,  George  Henry,  133,  133  n. 

Louis  IX,  of  France,  Saint,  4 

Library  of  Useful  Knowledge,  The, 
258 

Libya,  117 

Lichas,  202 

Licinius,  Porcius,  128  n. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  223 

Life  of  Hellas  of  Dicaearchua,  176 

Liguria,  186 

Lindus,  45 

Lipsius,  Justus,  57  n. 


Literary    History    of    Borne,    A,    of 

J.  Wight  Duff,  128  n. 
Liturgy,  The,  235 
Livy,  59 

Locrians,  The,  87 
Locris,  34 

Lotos-Eaters,  The,  of  Tennyson,  223 
Louleis    Laras    of    Dimitrios   Bikelas, 

258 
Lowell,  James  Russell,  195,  245 
Lucan,  187 
Lucian,  95,  220,  252 
Lucretius,  94,  187 
Lycaeus,  Mount,  207 
Lyceum,  The,  47,  59 
Lycia,  152 
Lycidas  of  Milton,  211,  211  n.,  212  n., 

213,  213  n. 
Lycurgus,  120 
Lyly,  John,  219 
Lysias,  58,  177 
Lysippus,  10 
Lysistrata,  The,  of  Aristophanes,  250 

Macbeth  of  Shakespeare,  162 

Macedon.     See  Macedonia 

Macedonia,  35,  48,  102,  117,  136,  178 

Macrobius,  189 

Magna  Graecia,  119,  121 

Mahaffy,  John  Pentland,  218,  218  n., 

219,  219  n.,  220,  221,  222,  222  n. 
Maine,  State  of,  247 
Malalas,  197 

Mallock,  William  Hurrell,  43 
Manet,  Edouard,  26 
Mantegna,  220 
Manuel  d'Histoire   de  la  LittSrature 

Grecque    of    Alfred    and    Maurice 

Croiset,  141  n. 
Marathon,  30,  61,  144 
Marcus  Aurelius,  54 
Marinism,  221 
Mark  Antony,  168 
Maro.    See  Virgil 
Martin  mis  Capella,  197 
Massachusetts,  245 
Masson,  David,  140  n. 


300 


INDEX 


Matapan,  Cape,  26 

Matilda,  4 

Matthews,  Brander,  244,  255 

Mauretania,  52 

Maury,  Alfred,  261  n.,  262,  265 

Maximus  Planudes,  185 

Medea,  245 

Medea,  The,  of  Euripides,  92  n.,  151  n., 
154  n. 

Mediterranean  Sea,  The,  28,  52,  53, 
248 

Melanippe,  The,  of  Euripides,  82 

Melesigenes  (z=  Homer),  47 

Meletai,  The,  of  Himerius,  177 

Melkarth,  The  Tyrian,  265 

Memoir es  de  I' Academic  des  Inscrip- 
tions et  Belles -Lettres,  267  n. 

Menander,  26,  81,  127,  146  n. 

Menelaus,  142,  191 

Meno,  The,  of  Plato,  127 

Menophanes,  176 

Mercury.    See  Hermes 

Mesolonghi,  45 

Messenia,  34 

Messenia,  Gulf  of,  34 

Metamorphoses,  The,  of  Ovid,  215, 
215  n. 

Meton,  74 

Michael  of  Wordsworth,  223 

Michigan,  248 

Midias,  79 

Middle  Ages,  The,  3,  95,  104,  112,  130, 
184,  185,  218,  219,  235 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  133,  133  n.,  256 

Millet,  Jean  Francois,  223 

Milman,  Henry  Hart,  133,  133  n. 

Milton,  1,  2,  25,  47,  47  n.,  77  n.,  191, 
192,  193,  199,  202,  203,  204,  205  n., 
206,  207  n.,  208,  208  n.,  209,  209  n., 
210,  210  n.,  211,  212,  212  n.,  213, 
214,  215,  216,  217 

Minerva.     See  Athena 

Minorca,  Island  of,  51 

Minyae,  The,  35 

Missouri,  State  of,  248 

Mistra,  45 


Mithridates,  50 

Mohammedans,  The,  235,  265,  276 

Moira,  151 

Moirai,  The,  151,  153 

Monemvasia,  45 

Montaigne,  195 

Montfort,  Simon  de,  4 

Moors,  The,  50 

Morhof,  Daniel  Georg,  57  n. 

Morley,  John,  Viscount,  77  n. 

Mormonism,  270 

Morn,  212,  213,  214,  215,  217 

Moslems,    The.      See    Mohammedans, 

The 
Moulton,  Eichard  G.,  132  n. 
Mulciber.    See  Hephaestus 
Miiller,  Karl  Otfried,  258 
Murray,  Gilbert,  43,  168 
Museum,  The,  of  Alexandria,  112 
Mycenae,  248 

Myers,  Ernest,  39  n.,  46,  145  n.,  155  n. 
Myrrha,  187 

Naevius,  124 

Naples,  26 

Napoleon  I,  33 

Napoleon  III,  132,  133 

Narcissus,  208 

Nation,  The  (New  York),  218 n. 

Natura  Deorum,  De,  of  Cicero,  92  n. 

Natural   History   and   Physiology    of 

Plants,  The,  of  Theophrastus,  10 
Natural  History,  The,  of  Pliny,  189 
Nauplia,  45 
Nausicaa,  38 
Naxos,  Island  of,  34,  45 
Necessity,  206  n. 
Neoptolemus,  the  actor,  174 
Nepos,  Cornelius,  122  n. 
Neptune.    See  Posidon 
Neva,  Eiver,  229 
Newman,  John  Henry,  49,  49  n. 
New  Testament,  The,  4,  192 
Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  236 
New  York  City,  255 
Nicholas  of  Pisa,  4 
Nicias,  15 


INDEX 


301 


Nicomachean  Ethics,  The,  of  Aristotle, 

5,  11,  12,  15,  19  n.,  141  n.,  157,  158, 

161,  162 
Niebuhr,  Barthold  Georg,  123,  268 
Nietzsche,  Friedrich,  229 
Night,  206 
Nile,  The,  204 
Niobe,  278 

Nitzsch,  K.  W.,  123  n. 
North  Sea,  The,  40 
Norton,  Charles  Eliot,  36 
Norway,  28 
Nossis,  182 
Nouvelle  Geographie  Universelle  of  E. 

Eeclus,  92  n.,  96  n. 
Nouvelles  Jttudes  d  'Histoire  Beligieuse 

of  Ernest  Kenan,  261  n. 
Numa,  121 
Nyseian  isle,  203 

Oath,  151 

Ode,  Intimations  of  Immortality,  of 

Wordsworth,  223 
Odes,  The,  of  Horace,  209  n. 
Odysseus,  38,  89,  142,  153,  191,  208, 

245,  272 
Odyssey,  The,  of  Homer,  12,  37,  89, 

124,  136,  136  n.,  152  n.,  153  n.,  208, 

208  n. 
Oechalia,  202 
Oedipus,  136,  137,  139,  148,  149,  150, 

156,  157,  158,  159,  160,  161,  162 
Oedipus  at  Colonus,  The,  of  Sophocles, 

136,  136  n.,  137  n.,  150 
Oedipus  Bex,  The,  of  Sophocles,  156, 

157,  161,  162 
Oeta,  Mount,  202 
Ohio,  State  of,  248 

Old  Palace  of  Florence,  The,  4 

Old  Pictures  in  Florence  of  Robert 
Browning,  278 

Olympia,  9 

Olympian  and  Pythian  Odes  of  Pin- 
dar, The,  of  Basil  L.  Gildersleeve, 
140  n. 

Olympians,  The,  93 

Olympic,  203 


Olympus,  Mount,  31,  35,  106,  140,  147, 

162,  200,  215,  278 
Opimian,  218 

Orator,  The,  of  'Silvayn,'  221 
Oratore,    Be,    of    Cicero,    91,    91  n., 

120  n.,  121 
Ordine  Docendi  et  Studendi,  Be,  of 

Battista  Guarino,  188 
O'Rell,  Max,  244,  253 
Orestes,  7,  13,  136,  150 
Orestes,  The,  of  Euripides,  80,  173 
Oribasius,  179 
Orion,  180 
Orontes,  203 
Orpheus,  204 
Orphics,  The,  181 
Osgood,  Charles  G.,  199,  199  n. 
Osier,  Sir  William,  9 
Othello  of  Shakespeare,  148  n. 
Otus,  52 
Our  Debt  to  Antiquity  of  Thaddaeus 

Zielinski,  226  n. 
Ovid,  185,  187,  195,  201,  206,  208,  214, 

215,  219,  220 
Oxford  University,  168  n. 
Oxyrhynchus,  172 

Pacuvius,  124 

Paganism  and  Mr.   Lowes  Dickinson 

of  Gilbert  K.  Chesterton,  269,  269  n. 
Paganisme  of  Ernest  Renan,  261  n. 
Pallas.     See  Athena 
Palmer,  George  Herbert,  6,  6  n. 
Pan,  31,  144,  203,  204,  207,  271 
Pandemonium,  207 
Pandora,  248 
Pangaeus,  Mount,  29 
Paradise  Lost  of  Milton,  202,  202  n., 

203,  203  n.,  205,  205  n.,  206,  207  n., 

208  n.,    209  n.,    210  n.,    211  n.,    212, 

212  n.,  213  n.,  214 
Paradise  Regained  of  Milton,  47,  47  n., 

205,  205  n.,  207,  207  n.,  212,  212  n. 
Paris   (=  Alexander),  210 n.,  245 
Parmenides,  175 
Parnassus,  Mount,  252 


302 


INDEX 


Parnes,  Mount,  31,  51 

Paros,  Island  of,  45 

Parrhasius,  122 

Parthenon,  The,  7,  9,  39,  58,  64 

Passion,  The,  of  Milton,  205  n. 

Pastor  Fido,  The,  of  Guarini,  220 

Patagonia,  241 

Pater,  Walter,  269 

Patroclus,  152 

Paul,  Saint,  7,  25 

Pausanias,  169,  220 

Pavia,  187 

Peacock,  Thomas  Love,  218 

Peace,  The,  of  Aristophanes,  42 

Pelasgians,  The,  35,  85,  100,  261 

Peloponnese,  The,  30,  35 

Pelops,  148,  243 

Penelope,  273 

Pentelicus,  Mount,  31,  34,  42,  51 

Pericles,  2,  4,  50,  58,  63,  64,  65,  66, 

67,  68,  69,  70,  71,  72,  73,  74,  75, 

109,  116,  134 
Peripatetic  school,  The,  48,  89 
Perrault,  Charles,  193 
Persia,  35,  64,  74,  102 
Persians,  The,  63,  64,  65,  66,  99,  261, 

262 
Persica,  The,  of  Ctesias,  176 
Petersburg,  St.,  University  of,  226 
Petrarch,  188 
Petrie,  Flinders,  171 
Petrograd,  226  n. 
Phaedo,  The,  of  Plato,  171 
Phaedra,  143,  144,  145 
Phaedrus,  44 

Phaedrus,  The,  of  Plato,  5,  200,  201  n. 
Phidias,  10,  50,  58,  64,  74 
Philaporus,  81 
Philemon,  81 

Philip  of  Maeedon,  64,  136 
Philippi,  54 
Philippica,  The,  of  Theopompus,  176, 

182 
Phillips,  Stephen,  245 
Philiscus,  59 
Philoctetes,  41 


Philoctetes,  The,  of  Sophocles,  146, 
149,  149  n. 

Philodemus,  181 

Philostratus,  220 

Phocis,  34 

Phoebus.    See  Apollo 

Phoenicia,  73,  262,  262  n. 

Phoenicians,  The,  99 

Phoenissae,  The,  of  Euripides,  139  n., 
172,  173 

Photius,  Patriarch  of  Constantinople, 
175,  176,  177,  178,  180 

Phrygians,  The,  261,  262 

Phrynichus,  82 

Pickard-Cambridge,  A.  W.,  77  n. 

Pindar,  38,  39,  46,  140,  140  n.,  145  n., 
146,  146  n.,  148,  148  n.,  151,  151  n., 
154,  154  n.,  155,  155  n.,  175,  178, 
179,  219,  251,  255,  256 

Pindus  Mountains,  34 

Piraeus,  30,  45,  53,  54,  72,  73,  75 

Pisa,  4 

Pisistratidae,  The,  107,  116 

Pisistratus,  49,  72 

Pitt,  William,  the  elder,  Earl  of  Chat- 
ham, 195 

Pitt,  William,  the  younger,  195 

Pius  Quintus,  Pope,  191 

Planudes,  Maximus,  185 

Plato,  5,  10,  25,  44,  47,  57,  58,  59,  60, 
80,  83,  88  n.,  94,  99,  104,  112,  113, 
118,  127,  130,  130  n.,  145,  145  n., 
167,  168,  170,  171,  178,  181,  186, 
189,  200,  201,  220,  222,  223,  251, 
256,  257 

Pleasure,  207  n. 

P16iade,  The,  194 

Pleiades,  The,  213,  213  n. 

Pliny,  the  elder,  95,  189 

Plotinus,  220,  267 

Plutarch,  50,  91,  91  n.,  95,  178,  201, 
219,  254 

Poetae  Lyrici  Graeci,  ed.  Bergk,  89  n. 

Poetics,  The,  of  Aristotle,  83,  138, 
138  n.,  157,  162,  221,  222 

Poggio,  188 


INDEX 


303 


Poland,  276 

Polemo,  61,  185 

Politian,  192 

Politics,  The,  of  Aristotle,  11,  14, 
14  n.,  87  n.,  130  n. 

Polybius,  166,  197,  247 

Polybus,  159 

Polycletus,  122 

Polygnotus,  58,  74 

Polynices,  136 

Pompeii,  220 

Pope,  Alexander,  196,  218 

Porch,  The,  54 

Portpipe,  218 

Porphyry,  267,  268 

Posidon,  148,  151,  207,  212 

Posidonius  of  Rhodes,  89 

Praxiteles,  9,  169 

pre-Hellenic  age,  The,  116,  252 

pre-Hellenic  races,  The,  85 

pre-Homeric  age,  The,  106 

Proaeresius,  55,  59,  60 

Problems  of  Life  and  Mind  of  G.  H. 
Lewes,  133  n. 

Problems,  The,  of  Aristotle,  97  n. 

Proclus,  267 

Prolegomena  to  Ethics  of  Thomas 
Hill  Green,  63 

Prometheus,  40,  146,  147,  206  n. 

Prometheus  Bound,  The,  of  Aeschylus, 
40,  146,  146  n.,  147 

Prometheus  Unbound,  The,  of  Aeschy- 
lus, 147 

Prophetic  Pictures,  The,  of  Nathaniel 
Hawthorne,  137 

Propyl  aea,  The,  64 

Proserpina,  203,  204 

Protagoras,  59,  182 

Prussia,  275 

Psalms,  The,  213  n. 

Pseudo-Dionysius,  186,  220 

Psyche,  207,  207  n. 

Ptolemaios,  180 

Ptolemies,  The,  57 

Pulci,  Luigi,  220 

Purgatorio,  The,  of  Dante,  4  n.,  186 


Pyrenees,  The,  28 
Pythagoreans,  The,  182 
Pythia,  The,  256 

Quintilian,  185,  188,  190 

Eaeers,  Frieze  of  the,  278 

Eand,  Edward  Kennard,  183,  183  n. 

Ranke,  Leopold  von,  170 

Raphael  (=  Raffaello  Sanzio),  220 

Raphael,  the  archangel,  209  n. 

Ravaisson-Mollien,  Jean  Gaspard 
Felix,  267,  267  n. 

Reclus,  E.,  92  n.,  96  n. 

Red  Sea,  The,  176,  177 

Reformation,  The,  130,  193 

Renaissance,  The,  3,  26,  27,  164,  184, 
185,  188,  192,  193,  194,  201,  208  n., 
217,  218,  219,  220,  221,  235 

Renan,  Ernest,  96,  96  n.,  261,  261  n. 

Republic,  The,  of  Plato,  5,  10,  88  n., 
130  n.,  145  n.,  200  n.,  201  n.,  257 

Reverence,  151 

Rhea,  204 

Bhesus,  The  (f  of  Euripides),  174 

Rhetores  Graeci,  177 

Rhetoric,  The,  of  Aristotle,  11,  12 

Rhodes,  Island  of,  45 

Rhodians,  The,  91 

Ribbeck,  Otto,  254 

Rogers,  Benjamin  Bickley,  80  n. 

Roman  Empire,  The,  117,  128,  167, 
185,  186,  246,  253,  257 

Roman  Republic,  The,  119 

Romans,  The,  94,  95,  99,  100,  118, 
119,  120,  121,  122,  123,  124,  125, 
126,  127,  164,  184,  199,  248,  257 

Rome,  1,  3,  5,  10,  23,  33,  54,  59,  61, 
91,  96  n.,  102,  117,  119,  120,  121, 
122,  123,  124,  125,  126,  127,  167, 
183,  184,  186,  193,  202,  203,  228, 
229,  236,  254,  257 

Rome,  The  Church  of,  271 

Romische  Annalistik,  Die,  of  K.  W. 
Nitzsch,  123  n. 

Romulus,  77  n.,  128 

Roosevelt,  Theodore,  5 


304 


INDEX 


Kousseau,  Jean  Jacques,  196,  236 
Rudolphus  Agricola,  190 
Russell,  William  Howard,  56  n. 
Kussia,  226,  228,  232,  233,  234 

Sacred  Way,  The,  59 

'  Salaminia, '  The  ship,  70 

Salamis,  30,  66 

Sallust,  125 

Samosata,  252 

Samson,  197,  205  n.,  206  n. 

Samson  Agonistes  of  Milton,  205  n. 

Samuel,  187 

Sandys,  Sir  John  Edwin,  15  n. 

Sannazaro,  Jacopo,  219 

Sappho,  37,  38,  39,  175,  177,  182 

Sardis,  75,  178 

'Saronic   waves,'    The.     See   Aegina, 

Gulf  of 
Sarpedon,  152,  154 
Satan,  47  n.,  205,  209,  210  n. 
Satires,  The,  of  Horace,  124  n. 
Satires,  The,  of  Juvenal,  86  n. 
Saturn,  186,  206,  208 
Saturnalia,  The,  45 
Scaliger,  Julius  Caesar,  194 
Scandinavian  races,  The,  94 
Scandinavians,  The,  92 
Schiller,  108,  196 
Scipio,  203 
Scotland,  28,  29 
Scylla,  207,  211 
Sedley,  Amelia,  181 
Semitic  peoples,  The,  261,  267 
Sempronius,  Publius,  121 
Seneca,  219 
Sentiment  Eeligieux  en  Grece,  Le,  of 

Jules  Girard,  96,  96  n. 
Sextus  Quintus,  Pope,  191 
Shakespeare,  1,  9,  71  n.,  95,  109,  147, 

149  n.,  162,  181,  210,  256 
Shakespeare  of  Thomas  De  Quincey, 

140  n. 
Shelley,  23,  23  n.,  42,  222 
Shorey,  Paul,  183  n. 
Sibylline  books,  The,  123 
Sicilians,  The,  91 


Sicily,  35,  59,  60,  73,  117 

Siicle    de    Louis    le    Grand,    Le,    of 

Charles  Perrault,  193 
'Silvayn,'  221 
Simeon  Stylites,  Saint,  270 
Simon  de  Montfort,  4 
Simonides,    135,    135  n.,    155,    155  n., 

175,  223 
Sky,  The,  263 
Slavonic  peoples,  The,  262 
Smith,  Hopkinson,  254 
Smith,  William,  10  n. 
Society  for  the  Diffusion  of   Useful 

Knowledge,  The,  258 
Socrates,  5,  7,  8,  19,  44,  48,  80,  94, 

96  n.,  99,  113,  115,  244,  256 
Solon,  68,  105,  120,  152,  154 
Sonnets,  The,  of  Milton,  202  n. 
Sophocles,  6,  9,  13,  41,  58,  64,  75,  82, 

83,  84,  122,  136,  136  n.,  138  n.,  141, 

141  n.,    145,    145  n.,    146,    148,   149, 

149  n.,  151  n.,  153,  154  n.,  160,  162, 

175,  181,  219 
Sophronius,  61 
Sorbonne,  The,  193 
Sower,  The,  of  Millet,  223 
Spain,  28,  95,  117,  190,  228 
Spaniards,  The,  50,  232 
Sparta,  29,  31,  33,  34,  64,  102,  104, 

116,  120,  121,  122,  249,  256 
Spartans,  The,  91,  259 
Spenser,  Edmund,  207  n.,  208  n. 
Sphinx,  The,  160,  205 
Spring,  The,  203 
Stanley,  Arthur  Penrhyn,  244 
Stesichorus,  175 

Stevenson,  Eobert  Louis,  255,  272 
Stewart,  Hugh,  226  n. 
Stoa,  The,  47 
Stobaeus,  180 
Stobart,  John  Clarke,  25 
Stoics,  The,  48,  99,  127,  256 
Storr,  Francis,  136  n.,  145  n. 
Strabo,  247 
Strepsiades,  126 
Strong,  H.  A.,  226  n. 


INDEX 


305 


Studies  in  Literature   of  Lord  Mor- 

ley,  77  n. 
Stylites,  Saint  Simeon,  270 
Sunium,  Cape,  51 
Suppliants,    The,    of    Aeschylus,    146, 

146  n.,  147  n. 
Swinburne,  Algernon  Charles,  25,  269 
Switzerland,  29 
Symposium,  The,  of  Plato,  5,  7,  99, 

170,  257 
Syracuse,  15 

Syria,  57,  59,  60,  73,  95,  252 
System  of  Logic,  A,  of  John  Stuart 

Mill,  133  n. 

Tacitus,  95,  125 

Taft,  William  Howard,  5 

Taine,  Hippolyte,  166,  253 

Tanagra,  91 

Tantalus,   140,   206  n. 

Tarasius,  175 

Tarentum,  124 

Tartarus,  209 

Tasso,  Torquato,  219 

Tatius,  Achilles,  219 

Taygetus,  Mount,  34 

Tecmessa,  142 

Tegea,  135 

Telesio,  220 

Tempe,  Vale  of,  31,  50 

Tennessee,  State  of,  247 

Tennyson,   Alfred,    1,   221,   222,    223, 

245 
Terence,  127,  127  n. 
Teucer,  142 

Thebes,  35,  136,  159,  160 
Themis,  147  n. 
Themistocles,  64 
Theocritus,  36,  44,  186,  219,  223 
Theodosius  II,  Emperor,  127 
Theognis,  89,  89  n.,  97,  97  n.,  147  n., 

152,   179,   260 
Theogony,  The,  of  Hesiod,  209 
Theophrastus,  10,  11,  12,  15,  59 
Theopompus,  176,  182 
Theramenes,  244 
Thermopylae,  135 


Thersander,  150 

Theseus,  278 

'Thessalian  vale,'   The.     See  Tempe, 

Vale  of 
Thessaly,  29,  34,  35,  59,  114,  135,  247 
Thirteenth    Chapter    of    First    Corin- 
thians, The,  5 
Thornax,  Mount,  264 
Thrace,  29,  59,  71,  73,  117 
Thrasymachus,  182 
Thucydides,  son  of  Melesias,  70 
Thucydides,  the  historian,  57,  63,  64, 

65,  69,  69  n.,  70,  74,  75,  86,  86  n., 

90,  90  n.,  134,  134  n.,  136,  170,  186, 

252,  258 
Times,  The  London,  56  n. 
Tiresias,  137,  160,  161 
Titans,  The,  93,  146,  209 
Tithonus,  43 
Titian,  220 

Todd,  Henry  John,  213  n. 
Trachiniae,  The,  of  Sophocles,  146 
'  Tradition '  of  Greek  Literature,  The, 

of  Gilbert  Murray,  168 
Tragedies  of  Sophocles,   The,  Jebb's 

translation  of,  13  n.,  14  n.    See  also 

Jebb,  Sir  Richard 
Tragic  Drama  of  the  Greeks,  The,  of 

A.  E.  Haigh,  9  n. 
Triton,  River,  203 
Trollope,  Frances  M.,  244 
Trojan  Women,  The,  of  Euripides,  43 
Troy.     See  Ilium 
Troizen   (=  Trozen),  171 
Trozen  (?  Troizen),  171 
Tubal-cain,  254 
Tucker,  T.  G.,  146  n. 
Tully.    See  Cicero 
Turks,  The,  132 
Turnus,  187 
Tusculanae   Bisputationes    of    Cicero, 

121  n.,  122  n.,  125  n.,  126  n. 
Typhoeus,  93,  209 
Tzetzes,  180 

Ulysses.    See  Odysseus 

Ulysses  of  Stephen  Phillips,  245 


306 


INDEX 


Ulysses  of  Tennyson,  245,  272 

Umbricius,  86 

United  States  of  America,  The,  1,  2, 

4,  6,  10,  11,  14,  73,  102,  228,  244, 

246,  248,  258,  259 
Upper  City  of  Athens,  75 

Vacation  Exercise,  At  a,  of  Milton, 

202  n. 
Valentinian  III,  Emperor,  127 
van  Dyke,  Henry,  244 
Varro,  122,  194 
Vassar  College,  132  n. 
Vedas,  The,  262,  264 
Venice,  276 
Venus.    See  Aphrodite 
Vergerio,  188 
Verrall,  A.  W.,  150  n. 
V  err  em,  In,  of  Cicero,  91  n. 
Vesta.    See  Hestia 
Vida,  Mario  Girolamo,  194 
Virgil,   1,  4,   5,  94,   94  n.,  95  n.,   163, 

184,  186,  187,  189,  194,   200,  209  n., 

210  n.,  212,  219,  220 
Virgin  Mary,  The,  186,  266 
Virginia,  State  of,  247,  251 
Virginia,  University  of,  243  n. 
Vishnu,  265 

Vita  Nuova,  The,  of  Dante,  5 
Vittorino  da  Feltre,  188,  190,  196 
Vives,  Juan  Luis,  190 
Voltaire,  236 
Voluptas,  207  n. 
Vulcan.     See  Hephaestus 

Wales,  29 

Wasps,  The,  of  Aristophanes,  10 
Welcker,  Friedrich  Gottlieb,  153 
Welldon,  J.  E.  C,  19  n. 


Wenley,  Eobert  M.,  183  n. 

Westminster,  4 

What  Have  the  Greeks  Done  for  Mod- 
ern Civilisation?  of  John  Pentland 
Mahaffy,  218  n.,  219  n.,  222  n. 

Whitman,  Walt,  244,  245 

Wilamowitz-Moellendorff,  Ulrich  von, 
163,  172,  182,  237 

Wilson,  Woodrow,  5 

Winckelmann,  Johann  Joachim,  164, 
196,  236 

Wolff,  Samuel  Lee,  218,  218  n. 

Wood,  Robert,  196 

Wordsworth,  William,  19,  22,  36,  39, 
196,  221,  222,  223,  274 

Works  and  Days,  The,  of  Hesiod,  87, 
152 

Xanthippus,  66 
Xanthus,  38 
Xenophon,  118 
Xerxes,  66,  141 

Yale  Review,  The,  168  n. 

Yale  Studies  in  English,  199  n. 

Youth,  207,  207  n 

Zeno  the  Stoic,  53,  59,  252 

Zephyr,  208 

Zeus,  8,  12,  35,  40,  43,  82,  136,  140, 

146,  147,  147  n.,  150,  151,  152,  153, 

154,   200,   201,   203,   205,   206,   207, 

209,  210  n.,  211,  264 
Zeus    und    sein    Verhaltnis    zu    den 

Hoirai    nach    Sophokles    of    Josef 

Kohn,  153  n. 
Zielinski,  Thaddaeus,  226,  226  n. 
Zola,  fimile,  132,  133,  133  n. 
Zwingli,  Ulrich  Huldreich,  193 


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